A Knife for the Ladies

1973's "A Knife for the Ladies" starts out as a whodunit set in the Old West, but it's clearly no Jack the Ripper and its few murder scenes are devoid of both blood and suspense. Old Tuscon is the Arizona location used by screenwriter Seton I. Miller, whose career dates back to 1927, his best horror item the stunning Lionel Atwill vehicle "Murders in the Zoo," which was actually far more gruesome for 1933 than anything seen in this tame release. Jeff Cooper's Edward Burns is a private investigator out to solve a series of stabbings in which the victims are all young women of ill repute, at odds with town sheriff Jarrod Colcord (top billed Jack Elam) for accusing the wrong man of the most recent crime. The killer could be saloon owner Virgil Hooker (Gene Evans), perhaps eager to divert suspicion by lynching an innocent man, or nervous barber/undertaker Orville Ainslie (Richard Schaal), whose behavior puts Burns on the trail of town founder Elizabeth Mescal (Ruth Roman), her late son a former deputy with a passion for the ladies. The promised horror film just isn't here, while the veteran presence of Jack Elam offers an aging character holding on to past glories, finding kinship with Burns and redemption in their success, once they learn how arsenic is used in medication. As offbeat as a Western can be, but spotty distribution through short lived Bryanston Pictures kept it from being widely seen (better known releases were "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre" and "The Devil's Rain"). Director Larry G. Spangler was no stranger to casting NFL players, using Oakland Raiders wideout Fred Biletnikoff here, two years after working with Joe Namath on another Western, "The Last Rebel." Making her final screen appearance is Diana Ewing, one of STAR TREK's most intoxicating beauties in the 1969 episode "The Cloud Minders."

City private investigator Jeff Cooper travels to frontier backwater in order to investigate the slasher murders of town matriarch Ruth Roman's son and a gaggle of local prostitutes. Things are complicated by the vigilante murder of a Mexican cowboy and brutish, old-school sheriff Jack Elam.

Mildly entertaining drive-in trash, this benefits from the old low-rent sets and ancient costumes that were pretty much a sign of the times in the early seventies. You can practically smell the mothballs, though they (the set-pieces not the mothballs) make this low, low-budget western/horror flick almost look like a million bucks. The weird, very exploitative climax is fun too, as are the presences of Elam and Roman.

For a better Jack-the-ripper-goes-west story, watch the Episode of Dead Man's Gun aptly titled "The Ripper".

A giallo-style murder mystery with a wild West setting, Knife For The Ladies stars Jeff Cooper as private detective Burns, who is hired to investigate the murder of several prostitutes in the once prosperous mining town of Mescal. Wild-eyed Jack Elam plays the town's gruff sheriff Jarrod, who initially isn't best pleased with Burn's appointment, but who eventually teams up with the private eye to find out who has been slicing up the working girls.

Knife For The Ladies has received some fairly scathing reviews here on IMDb, but I fail to understand why: fans of gialli should find plenty to enjoy about this murder mystery, the unseen killer wearing regulatory black gloves to kill the victims, with several deaths, and a suitably macabre revelation (I love the lurid ending!). The western setting is refreshingly different from the usual giallo Euro locale, and allows for a fun sub-plot with Burns and Jarrod having to contend with a lynch mob who wrongfully hanged a man for the murders.

Admittedly, the film isn't as stylish as many a giallo, director Larry G. Spangler failing to wow with the visuals, but on the whole I think this is a pretty entertaining movie with a decent plot and well-drawn characters - far better than the other reviews would have you believe.

In A KNIFE FOR THE LADIES, a small, old-western town is plagued by a serial-killing maniac. When the hard-drinking sheriff (Jack Elam) fails to catch the perpetrator, a private detective (Jeff Cooper) is brought in to solve the case. Unfortunately, the town roustabouts, led by the saloon owner (Gene Evans), don't want to wait that long.

This movie is a murder mystery with heavy doses of gothic-like horror. In fact, if it had been set in Victorian England, it could have easily been a HAMMER film with the likes of Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee in the lead roles. As it stands, it's a respectable mixed genre effort. Both Cooper and Elam are believable in their roles.

Don't miss the twist finale, and be sure to stick around for the big rock song at the end. It's a hoot!...

A bizarre yet watchable cross between a typical oater and a slasher film, KNIFE FOR THE LADIES (or better known as "Jack The Ripper Goes West" on DVD) is actually a fairly entertaining jumble of genres, aided by the one and only Jack "One-Eye" Elam as the town sheriff, a drunken, unwashed, temperamental SOB who loves his rotgut and loves to fight, all of which is exacerbated when a clean-cut private eye comes in from the big city to help the townsfolk stop an unknown murderer bumping off the women. Although the DVD version is obviously edited of some scenes, causing the story to leave gaps as big as the one in Terry-Thomas's smile,the film moves along at a good gallop until the somewhat predictable conclusion.