L'étrange vice de Madame Wardh

Much like the slasher films of the U.S., the Italian giallo movement is more known for its incredibly high highs than it's truly awful lows. It becomes fairly obvious once you start seeking a lot of these films out that there are more lousy ones than great ones, but every now and then, one surprises you and The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh is, indeed, very surprising.

Taking a more thoughtful and character driven approach to giallo storytelling, it focuses on Julie, an ambassador's wife who's gotten out of a troubled relationship with a sadist and just wants to move on with her life. It doesn't help that there's a mad razor murderer out there and her former lover has been stalking her. Even worse, she falls for a mysterious and handsome friend of a friend who complicates things even more.

The stunning Austrian location photography, beautiful music score, and hypnotic presence of Edwige Fenech helps things move along at a nice pace and having interesting character drama keeps things exciting even when the mad razor slasher isn't terrorizing anyone. This might make for a good gateway giallo for those unfamiliar with the genre. It's not as wild or supernatural as some of the nuttier ones and not as deathly dull as many of the lesser tier ones.

Sergio Martino's "Lo Strano vizio della Signora Wardh" (1970) is a welcome addition to the list of giallos that had remained long unseen for me. Martino has done some of the most interesting of the 70's exploitation cinema (like "Torso" and "Mountain of the Cannibal God") and also an interesting spaghetti western "Mannaja." The giallo hasn't as hard-to-follow and confusing plot as it could have, there are not too many characters which makes their efforts and plot turns easy to follow. The story is simple and involves strange murders closely related to beautiful Wardh lady. There are some masterfully constructed mystery / giallo segments that look no less ambitious than those of Dario Argento. I mean mostly the garage scene and the "gas" scene near the end. These build the suspense well and involve the audience much better than some of the more gore-oriented works of the genre. Martino's film has also some stylish and violent murders but fortunately he didn't concentrate only on them. The locations are simply stunning, and the end twist is surprising and certainly original in my opinion. I think this is among the best of the giallo genre, on the same level with Mario Bava's "Blood and Black Lace", the films by Argento and Tonino Valerii's "My Dear Killer", for example, to name just a few.

The Strange Vice of Mrs Wardh was the first giallo movie I saw and I remember thinking the main actress Edwige Fenech was beautiful beyond words. Saw it again recently on Tubi and unlike a lot of movies where over time my earlier opinion changes this time my opinion actually elevated in my admiration for her. She is mesmerizing and this movie has great atmosphere.

The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh has just about everything a Giallo fan could ask for. All of the necessary ingredients are here: brutal murders, bizarre sex scenes, plot twists, interesting camera work, a nice score, and Edwige Fenech. - Brutal Murders: The killer uses a razor to slash his victims' throats to ribbons resulting in plenty of blood flow. - Bizarre Sex: I don't' know about you but beating the crap out of your partner prior to engaging in sex seems pretty bizarre to me. - Plot Twists: Just when you're sure you finally gotten a handle on the plot and solved the mystery, The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh gives you yet another twist to wrap your mind around. - Interesting Camera Work: The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh is a great looking film with unusual camera angle and lens choices. Visually, it's very pleasing. - A Nice Score: Even though composer Nora Orlandi's main theme is repeated throughout the film, I never get tired of hearing it. It's a hauntingly beautiful piece that helps set the mood of the film very well. - Edwige Fenech: The Queen of the Giallo.

The plot involves a crazed killer with an eye for women is on the loose. Julie Wardh (Edwige Fenech) is very much afraid because of the direct threats she has received from the killer. She's also convinced the killer is an ex-boyfriend. When the real killer is himself killed, that should put an end to Julie's fears. But it doesn't. The threats against Julie's life continue. I readily admit that there are plot holes big enough to drive a truck through and lapses in logic the size of the Grand Canyon, but that hardly matters when you're having this much fun with a movie. Blemishes and all, The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh is a great example of the genre and one of the reasons I keep seeking out these hard to find Italian gems.

THE STRANGE VICE OF MRS. WARDH (Sergio Martino - Italy/Spain 1970).

A bit of an essential Giallo entry, Martino's first thriller, although I personally prefer his fourth giallo YOUR VICE IS A LOCKED ROOM AND ONLY I HAVE THE KEY (1972), also starring Edwige Fenech, which has the pleasant setting of a country-estate and is even more lurid, over-the-top and slightly less predictable than this one.

This was Fenech's first starring role for producer (and lover) Luciano Martino and the rest of the cast soon became Martino-regulars, playing very similar roles in his later films: Edwige Fenech as calculating victim, George Hilton as the ever-conniving smoothie and evil-looking Ivan Rassimov as the malicious outsider who would become one of the regular bad guys in Italian genre cinema. Fenech plays the kind of character here that would become her trademark, a sexually liberated, glamorous and utterly shallow fashionista. She plays Julie Wardh, the restless wife of an official at the American embassy in Vienna and an investment broker (either one of these, or both, quite an unusual combination of professions!) who is disturbed by reports about a sex killer. She is convinced she is being stalked by Jean (Rassimov), a sadistic ex-lover, and, worse still, suspects that he may the killer. We also learn, through numerous flashbacks, that they had quite a kinky and sadomasochistic relationship. In the meantime a killer, a blonde woman is slashed to death while taking a shower. This doesn't stop Julie from a little fawning with George (a suave George Hilton), the cousin of her attractive friend Carol. Unsurprisingly, she's the next target of the razor-killer who terrorizes her in an underground car park and even all the way into Spain, where she thought she was save.

Many of Martino's films feel a bit over-polished to me. I recently watched a whole bunch of his films, including his crime thriller THE VIOLENT PROFESSIONALS (1973) as well as Fulci's DON'T TORTURE A DUCKLING (1972), which easily is superior to this one, but very raw, even somewhat shabby and unpolished in comparison with Martino's carefully stylized productions. Certainly a handsome production with substantial doses of sexual perversion and misogynistic violence and enough twists and turns to make for an entertaining thriller. And one has to give it to him, Martino has a real knack in framing some impressive shots, such as the glass-breaking scene in one of Fenech's flashbacks. The plot is fairly straight-forward, not needlessly over-complicated and by giallo-standards, the number of oddball characters and bizarre suspects is limited, but the ending is incredibly far-fetched and even hints at the super-natural. Where did that suddenly came from, Gastaldi? Logic and common sense is best left home when watching this one, but - unless you're on medication - you're probably gonna need a couple of drinks to fully appreciate this pleasantly lurid masochistic puzzle.

Camera Obscura --- 7/10