Al tropico del cancro

Giallos are known to be a little incoherent at times without being a complete mess but this movie certainly is the latter. It's a real mess. Many scenes of the movie look spectacular, especially the outdoor shots in the Haitian streets with full of crowds. The movie's certainly got elements that could have made it into a much better film than it actually is. It's just too bad that the Italian sense for style doesn't always work and this time even the plot stank so bad that it should have been rewritten almost completely. In my opinion the main problem is that the film doesn't engage at all and the pacing is just lame. I didn't care much what would happen to the characters in it. It's a kind of a problem when i was supposed to sit down and keep myself watching the film for its entire length of one and half hour.

The dream sequence with Strindberg and the voodoo priest made me laugh really hard. It's really the moment that was supposed to be surreal and scary but ended up looking like a skit.

What really is disappointing is that how much better this film could have been. I can only recommend this film for giallo fans who don't care much if the film is good or bad.

"Death in Haiti" is by no means a stellar or exceptional Giallo, but it's nevertheless a modest pioneer of some sort. Its release year was 1972, and that year is widely considered as the peak-performance for the Italian Giallo. In other words, up until 1972, and still even 2-3 years after, all Giallo writers and directors largely followed the proven success formula. It wasn't until after the mid-70s, when the popularly of these films started to decrease, that they began experimenting with filming locations outside of Italy or mixing typical Giallo plots with elements from other exploitation sub genres. Directors Giampaolo Lomi and Edoardo Mulgargia were among the first ones to take the authentically Italian concept abroad, evidently to Haiti in this case, and added the aspects of psychedelic drugs and traditional voodoo rituals. Who knows, maybe they just wanted to treat themselves to a tropic holiday destination, but at least they also grabbed the opportunity to make an enjoyable Giallo at the same time!

Co-writer Anthony Steffen, formerly a Spaghetti Western star, invented a nicely glamourous role for himself as the respected Doctor Williams; surgeon and businessman on the island of Haiti. He's always surrounded by rich, dubious and sleazy people because Williams also happens to have invented a powerful new drug. Grace, the beautiful blond wife of William's childhood buddy Fred can confirm the drug is quite efficient, because it causes her to hallucinate about dozens of naked black men and having sex with a voodoo priest! With drugs and money involved, it naturally doesn't take long before people are getting killed in various gruesome ways by an unseen assailant. The Haitian locations are beneficiary for the film, even though the obligatory tribal/voodoo dance rites are rather tedious and basically just form a cheap excuse to depict gratuitous nudity. Those gorgeous native Haitian girls obviously dance topless, or what else did you think? The genuine typical Giallo-whodunit plot is naturally the best thing about the film, and I must say there's a fair amount of mystery and suspense around the identity of the sadist killer. The extremely brutal murder taking place in an abattoir already makes "Death in Haiti" worth tracking down.

I saw this for the first time recently. The poster looked cool n the review by Coventry regarding the gruesome kill made me see this boring giallo. The only redeeming factor is the hot babe Anita Strindberg, one of the first giallo queens. The babe had a unique chiseled face n sharp features n inspite of being very ectomorph (one can clearly see the breast bones rather than the cleavage), her face was really illecebrous. The film lacks suspense n tension n the weird naked dance n the dream sequence is laughable. The kills r forgettable except for the fatso's face.

(1972) Tropic of Cancer/ Al tropico del cancro (In Italian with English subtitles) CRIME THRILLER

Co-written and directed by Giampaolo Lomi and Edward G. Muller that has Fred (Gabriele Tinti) and his wife Gracie (Anita Strindberg) Wright arriving to Port-au-Prince, Haiti for the intention of see their good friend, biologist and doctor, Dr. Williams (Anthony Steffen). At the same time Dr. Williams also possesses a particular hallucinogenic formula that is being sought after. And through the lens of the killer, he ends up murdering one of Dr. Williams assistant, Douglas, his other assistant, Crotz (Richard Osborne) appears to be missing. Two other businessmen by the name of Mr. Peacock (Gordon Felio) and Mr. Garner (Stelio Candelli) are collaborating to get the formula on their own. At this point Dr Williams friend, Fred appear to be neutral until he decided to ditch his own wife in search of the formula himself by going through Williams papers.

This is another one of those movies where the main bad guy can appear to be at so many places at once as well as know everything about everyone.

A scientist invents a hallucinatory drug. Interest of different dubious people in this new drug lead to betrayal and murder.

This rather underrated and lesser known Italian thriller certainly has its flaws, nonetheless it belongs to the most innovative films of its genre that was booming in the early 1970s. Thanks to its fresh ideas packed in a traditional Giallo plot, it really stands out of the bulk, even though 1972 is probably the most Giallo-intense year ever. The most remarkable moments include feverish dream sequences that are erotic and nightmarish at the same time. The dreams are induced by similarly feverish Haitian voodoo rituals that feature mondo-style animal killing (there is also a non-ritualistic animal killing shown in a slaughterhouse - traces of social comment, obviously).

The erotic moments are more frequent and sensual than in the average Giallo, and they are very well done (as already mentioned, especially the dreams). The body count is also above average, and in the second half, the movie boosts some murders as creative as they are brutal. It also delivers elements of the spy film genre - drugs can always be sold for big money. And the climax is not necessarily Giallo-typical.

The leading cast consists of genre regulars: Anthony Steffen plays the inventive scientist and Gabriele Tinti the "hero"; Anita Strindberg is Grace, the woman with the unnerving dreams. On the other hand, the two directors are barely known and none of them made another Giallo (Edoardo Mulargia shot a few Westerns and some Women-in-Prison stuff, but nothing really significant).

AL TROPICO DEL CANCRO is not a masterpiece, but it's a sleeper of the genre with enough original and surprising elements to make it highly recommendable to the fans of the genre.