Starring Barbara Bouchet, Tomas Milian, Florinda Bolkan, Marc Borel, Irene Papas, Georges Wilson

(6-Good Film)

Creepy. Lurid. Grisly.

 Tagline: A classic tale of the perverse from director Lucio Fulci.

The majority of the Italian giallo films that I’ve seen have the same fascinations; a string of grisly murders, an unlikely hero trying to get to the bottom of it, for starters. Don’t Torture a Duckling is a little more thoughtful than most. A small superstitious town in Southern Italy deals with the unsolved murders of several school-aged boys. The local police and a clever news reporter investigate. Unlike other giallo films that I’ve seen, rather than following one protagonist, Don’t Torture a Duckling follows several characters at different times. It’s the town that’s the focus; how they handle these tragedies, how everyone has blood on their hands. Fulci gives the film a genuine psychological element that makes it stand out among its peers. It’s interesting work and, like most murder-mysteries, very entertaining. It does, however, become a little hokey in parts, a little melodramatic.

-Walter Tyrone Howard-

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