La pelle sotto gli artigli

I am inserting reviews for films I've seen that so far lack one, here follows my review for this.... 'There are a series of murders taking place, in each case there are traces of decomposed flesh under the victims nails, how can this be? Is there a link to the brilliant scientist (Gordon Mitchell) who is performing brain transplant experiments on baboons, who thinks he is close to cheating death itself… it's an obscure oddity and has a good 70's feel, and it's only 76m so overall it's worth a look.' I saw it under the title THE SKIN UNDER THE CLAWS, it was a worn video transfer 14x9 ratio, but had English subtitles.

The quote from the subject line is a perfect illustration of the IQ of this obscure and nearly impossible to trace down "giallo" (sort of, at least) from the unknown director Alessandro Santini. There's a maniac at large in the city who murders prostitutes and removes their organs. The only lead for the police is that all victims have pieces of dead skin underneath their nails, as if their assailant was a zombie. Meanwhile, a genius surgeon named Dr. Helmut entrusts his two prodigy doctor students that he's about to reach a breakthrough in the domain of organ transplants. Could it be there's a connection? Gee, I wonder...

The budget for this movie must have been an all-time low amount. I cannot imagine that Z-grade veteran actor Cameron Mitchell is expensive to cast, and yet it seems that Santini could only afford him for a few days of shooting. The kills are grisly, but the camerawork and lighting are so poor that you can hardly see what's happening. So, instead, the short running time (75 minutes) is stuffed with footage that is cheap and easy to shoot, like romantic montages (Dr. Helmut's students fall in love) and the inept police officers interrogating drunk witnesses. The end-twist is absurd, but reasonably satisfying considering the poor quality of the film overall. For avid and tolerant fans of Italian 70s horror only.