Une hache pour la lune de miel

A note: Was this movie ever called in English HATCHET FOR A HONEYMOON, rather than the awkward HATCHET FOR THE HONEYMOON? I seem to recall this from a Leonard Maltin book circa 1978. Or am I as cracked as Bava's protagonist?

For my money, this is primo vintage Bava--which is to say Dario Argento in top hat and tails, Jess Franco with a finishing-school diploma, or, to look at the glass as half empty, Richard Lester after three hits of dirty windowpane acid.

To top this voiceover narration, you'd have to go either to BARRY LYNDON or, on the other hand, MASSACRE MAFIA STYLE: "My name is John Harrington. I'm thirty years old. I am a paranoiac. Paranoiac! What a marvellous world. So delicate. And full of possibilities. The fact is, I'm completely mad." And so is Bava's odyssey through the crazy-straw-shaped brain of J. Harrington, Esq., a hunky sociopath whose sexual fires are only stoked by burying a hatchet in the flesh of virginal-looking brides in their white-veiled drag--and, when they have the ill fortune to be there, their bridegrooms.

The hyper-lusciosity of Bava's style suggests a Bertolucci blissfully unconcerned with agrarian collectivism. Mate that rococo with Nicolas Roeg's brand of kaleidoscopus maximus and you have an inkling of what Signior Mario is up to. Note to Greil Marcus: as a sequel to "Lipstick Traces," how about a book tracing the parallel histories of canonical surrealism (Bunuel-Dali-Aragon-Bataille) and Italian horror of the seventies?

1969's "Hatchet for the Honeymoon" remains under the radar in regard to the work of Italian director Mario Bava, familiar Hitchcock plot devices utilized quite differently and accompanied by a deceptively lush, romantic score. Not an obvious rip like "The Girl Who Knew Too Much" but a more subtle, first person take on "Psycho" scripted by Santiago Moncada ("Bell from Hell"), kicking off with the revelation that Stephen Forsyth's John Harrington is an admitted paranoiac going about the business of murdering newlywed brides by a compulsion to decipher a mystery from his childhood. His wife Mildred (Laura Betti) berates him for failing to live up to his duties as a husband, unable to make love to her on their wedding night because of 'those footsteps,' and using her wealth to rebuild the fashion business he inherited from his late mother (shades of "Blood and Black Lace"). With his handsome looks and muscular physique women are attracted to Harrington, outwardly charming yet still very much a child in his mind, carefully preserving his boyhood playroom for occasional visits. He also frequents a secret room inhabited by mannikins clad in all kinds of wedding gowns, where he produces the cleaver needed to commit each murder, another victim to inch closer to a terrible secret that he cannot remember. When Mildred goes too far with her insults and patent refusal to allow for a divorce, he does what any self respecting maniac would do, puts on a wedding veil himself to claim her as another piece to the puzzle, just as the nosy police inspector (Jesus Puente) arrives moments too late to catch his slippery quarry in the act. This doesn't free our hero from persecution, for his wife was a practitioner of spiritism and the occult, proceeding to haunt him by appearing at his side for all to see, all eyes but his, in a twist that finally pushes him over the edge for one last killing to end his trauma. Stephen Forsyth was a Canadian actor whose on screen career ended with this role, not an easy one to play or to earn any measure of sympathy, but we are allowed access to the character's thoughts (and shown the killer's perspective through his eyes), telling the tale in his own way and coolly disregarding his persistent enemies. For once credited as his own cinematographer, Bava delivers a rich tapestry of beauty underlying the depraved actions of a psychopath, covering his tracks almost too easily even as the blood dripping corpse of his hacked wife (with cleaver still embedded in her back) can be seen reflected on a tabletop right in front of the frustrated inspector. In this sequence, Harrington is shown watching a horror film on television, in fact Bava's own "Black Sabbath," as Boris Karloff advances on a screaming young woman, a self reflective yet heartfelt tribute following the actor's recent death in February 1969. Shooting in Barcelona commenced in Sept. 1968, budgetary problems preventing completion for nearly an entire year, still a relaxing period for the director who proclaimed this his favorite non-Karloff film.

It's sort of like Psycho, only not, and it's sort of like any number of other serial-killer movies, except you know who the bad guy is from literally the first scene. But we don't watch Mario Bava movies for the intricate plots or, as in this case, for the strong acting. We watch them for the grisly visuals! Man's a maestro of mayhem when it comes to presenting blood. Very stylish movie, very well shot. Forsyth is positively wooden, though.

Mario Bava giallo about a guy who runs a wedding dress design and manufacturing company in Paris - whilst having a sideline in murdering young brides whilst they're wearing their wedding dresses. That's not a spoiler; unlike most gialli, in this one we know who the killer is right from the start. The mystery is more involved with his motivation. We know that each killing helps him piece together some long-forgotten childhood trauma, and that he's compelled to keep killing until he's got the whole picture - but exactly what that trauma is we don't know until the end. Canadian actor Stephen Forsyth plays the killer, who in character feels like a cross between Norman Bates and Patrick Bateman, whilst looking like a cross between Clint Eastwood and Timothy Dalton (Forsyth only made 10 movies for some reason, of which this was his last). It's a bit lighter on blood than you'd expect from the title, and there aren't too many onscreen kills. But it does have a real switch-up halfway through when it becomes a ghost story! It's not as gripping as some of Bava's stuff, but it's still fun. 6.5/10.

John Harrington runs a model agency specialising in bride gowns. He likes model railways and occasionally dressing up as a bride. The latter means he's in killer mode doing what he must do or, as he puts it, 'continue to wield the cleaver' until his 'issues' are resolved. The title suggests a similarity to Leonard Kastle's The Honeymoon Killers but in reality the films are far apart. Kastle's film is gritty, almost documentary-like and contains the massive presence of Shirley Stoler, while Bava opts for a style flamboyant even by giallo standards and has a handsome cast to match.

The spirit of Psycho looms large, though Bava's lightness of touch offsets the potentially gruesome subject matter - there's a very funny scene in a kitsch disco (with terrific music) where the cleaver wielder is thrown out for suggesting a threesome involving one of the dancers and his dead wife. It's true to say that it's style over substance, but that's the point