A Blade in the Dark

Bruno goes to stay at a beautiful but secluded country villa too finish off the score for director Sandra new horror film. The film is a personal story about the death of a child that she was close to when young. Someone who was haunted by questions of their sexuality and gender. These lead the child to fight back. Ultimately however they die in mysterious circumstances. The villa also has some very disturbing secrets and Bruno is just finding out how creepy things can get when you alone in a place far from home.

This has it all and in spades. We have a film within a film, dual plots about sex and violence. The staple challenges of sexuality and gender that crop up in every single Giallo of the early 80s. With Bava the younger I always find his film frustrates because it is either very good or very bad. This is very good but suffers from that mid second act weight that pulls the film down. This is purely to do with a story that is weaker than a thrice used tea bag. Visually however the film excels.Recalling a comment made by the great film maker Orson Welles that 'A film is never really good unless the camera is an eye in the head of a poet'. A Blade in the dark is the sort of film that really aspired to be better than the soft script and subject matter would have suggested.

It has a catalogue of very intelligent shots. These are technical in ways that would impress a film lover like me. Bava it seems was almost awe struck by the way a camera can and does become a person itself. He uses it to explore the world of his creation with a real engagement. Searching through space, panning in the interior, sweeping the exterior and even phantom riding us to a very unexpected (unless you have seen a host of Giallo films) ending. This invigorates the viewer and the jaded, long in the tooth film reviewer. It also tells me something about the time it was made. Argento had released the masterful Tenebrae. When Moviedrome is rebooted watch that if you liked this. That is even better!

The disc is a little vanilla for my tastes but the transfer is top notch. The sound has been cleared up nicely from that awful Vipco version and the whole feels more complete and less murky. We see everything as we were supposed to!