Corrado Olmi | Through the Shattered Lens

After the good but somewhat generic Cat o’Nine Tails, Dario Argento returned to form with his third film, 1971’s Four Flies on Grey Velvet.

It’s not particularly easy to describe the plot of Four Flies because, much like The Bird With The Crystal Plumage, the storyline is less important than the way that Argento tells it. The film tells the story of Roberto Tobias (Michael Brandon), a drummer with an up-and-coming rock band in Rome. In many ways, Roberto is a typical drummer. He’s the guy who, even though he’s often obscured in the background, keeps things balanced. He has a loving wife, Nina (Mimsy Farmer), a nice house, and worldly, politically woke friends who smoke weed and praise art. Admittedly, one of those friends does tell a rather gruesome story about witnessing a beheading in Saudi Arabia which leads to Roberto having a reoccurring nightmare but otherwise, Roberto would appear to have a great life.

(Incidentally, Roberto’s nightmares are Argento at his best.)

So, why is this stable and easy-going guy suddenly being followed by a mysterious man in a suit? And why, when Roberto confronts the man, does he discover that there’s yet another mysterious figure — this one wearing a mask — following him and taking pictures?

That’s the mystery that opens Four Flies on Grey Velvet but it’s not the only mystery to be found in the film. In fact, this movie finds Argento at both his most macabre and his most playful. At times, he literally seems to be seeing just how far he can push and how complicated he can make things before totally losing his audience. The film may start with Roberto being followed and having nightmares but eventually, it comes to involve everything and everyone from Nina’s enigmatic cousin, Dalia (Francine Racette) to a beatnik named God (played by none other than spaghetti western mainstay, Bud Spencer) to a flamboyant private investigator (Jean-Pierre Marielle). (By today’s standards, the portrayal of the gay detective has a few cringey moments but you have to remember that Four Flies On Grey Velvet was made in 1971. It was nothing less than revolutionary for an Italian film of that era to portray an openly gay contemporary character in any type of positive light.) To top it all off, the solution to the film’s main mystery is discovered through optography, the long-since discredited idea that an eye will “save” the last image seen before death. It’s ludicrous but Argento pulls it off with a cheerfully over-the-top style that perfectly matches the film’s twisted plot. After the toned down Cat o’Nine Tails, Four Flies was Argento’s way of reminding viewers of who he truly was as a filmmaker.

The film’s brilliant opening sets the tone for the entire film. Watch it below and thank me later:

It’s rare that anyone every really discusses the acting in an Argento film. Argento has himself admitted that he doesn’t worry much about actors and many of his films have been released in badly dubbed versions, which often makes it difficult to fairly judge any of the performances. That said, Roberto Tobias is one of my favorite Argento protagonists and it’s all due to Michael Brandon’s performance. Brandon makes Roberto into such a nice guy and does such a good job of capturing his descent into paranoia that it’s impossible not to get caught up in his story. (I would even argue that the long-haired and politically concerned Roberto is almost an autobiographical stand-in for Argento himself.) Though I can’t really explain why without running the risk of spoiling a major part of the movie, Mimsy Farmer is also excellent. Reportedly, Argento originally wanted to cast Mia Farrow and you can imagine a post-Rosemary’s Baby pre-Woody Allen Farrow in the role. But I’m glad that Argento couldn’t get her because Mimsy Farmer gives a close to perfect performance.

Four Flies was the third and final part of Argento’s “animal trailer,” and, at the time, Argento declared that Four Flies would also be his final giallo film. He followed up Four Flies with The Four Days, a historical comedy that was considered to be such a failure that, after its release, Argento returned to the safety of the giallo genre and gave the world one of his greatest triumphs, Deep Red. However, if The Four Days had been a success and Four Flies had been Argento’s final giallo film, it would have been a triumphant note to go out on.

Here’s the very misleading trailer that was used for Four Flies On Grey Velvet‘s American release.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raTtFzQ1vNo

And here’s the even more obscure European trailer!

(I’m using this year’s horrorthon as an excuse to watch and review all of the films of Dario Argento. Yesterday, I reviewed The Bird With The Crystal Plumage. Today, I take a look at The Cat o’Nine Tails.)

In 1971, Dario Argento followed up the massive success of The Bird With The Crystal Plumage with his second film as a director, The Cat o’Nine Tails. While The Cat o’Nine Tails was another huge financial success, it’s never been as a critically acclaimed as Argento’s first film. Argento, himself, regularly cites The Cat o’Nine Tails as being his least favorite of all of the films that he’s directed.

Much like The Bird With The Crystal Plumage, The Cat o’Nine Tails is a giallo that uses it’s rather complicated mystery as an excuse (a MacGuffin, to quote Hitchcock) for several suspenseful set pieces, the majority of which end with someone suffering some sort of terrible fate. In this case, a series of murders are taking place around a mysterious medical complex, the Terzi Institute. The murders are connected to some research being done at the institute. I’m not going to spoil things by revealing what exactly is being researched but I will say that the key to the mystery is vaguely ludicrous, even by the typically flamboyant standards of the giallo genre.

But, then again, so what? The fact that the genre’s mysteries are often overly complex and feature solutions that don’t always make sense is actually one of the appeals of the giallo film. You don’t really watch a giallo for the mystery. You watch it to see how the story will be told. Perhaps more than any other genre, giallo requires a director with a strong vision.

And, if nothing else, Argento has always had a strong directorial vision. Even when you may disagree with the choices that he makes (and I’m sure we all wonder why, in his later films, Argento grew so obsessed with telepathic insects), you can’t deny that they’re always uniquely Argento. Though the film never reaches the delirious heights of The Bird With The Crystal Plumage, The Cat o’Nine Tails still has several strong set pieces. There’s a sequence involving a poisoned glass of milk that I particularly appreciate. And then there’s the long scene at the crypt, in which our two protagonists realize that they don’t really trust each other all that much. And, of course, there’s the ending. For a film that’s often dismissed as being lesser Argento, The Cat o’Nine Tails features one of Argento’s darkest endings.

The Cat o’Nine Tails is unique as being one of the only Argento films to regularly show up on TCM. A lot of that is because The Cat o’Nine Tails is perhaps the least gory of all the films that Argento has made. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t plenty of death and mayhem. There is. Blood is spilled but it never exactly flows. The Cat o’Nine Tails is an Argento film that you could probably safely watch with an elderly relative. That’s not necessarily meant as a complaint. It’s just an observation that, when compared to the panty murder in The Bird With The Crystal Plumage or the skewering in The Mother of Tears, Cat o’Nine Tails is definitely a toned down Argento film.

The other reason why The Cat o’Nine Tails is popular on TCM is because it stars none other than that classic film mainstay, Karl Malden. Continuing the Argento tradition of featuring protagonists who aren’t sure what they’ve witnessed, Malden plays a former newspaper reporter who is now blind. He teams up with another reporter (played by James Franciscus, who may not have been a great actor but who did have perfect hair) to solve the murders. Franciscus has the eyes. Malden has the brains. And Malden’s niece, Lori (Cinzia De Carolis), is largely present to provide the film with its final ironic twist.

Malden does a pretty good job in the role, too. I’ve read some reviews that have complained that Malden overacts but actually, he gives the perfect performance for the material. In fact, Malden’s unapologetically hammy performance contrasts nicely with the work of James Franciscus, which could charitably be called subdued. (Perhaps a better description would be dull…)

Cat o’Nine Tails may not be Argento’s best but I still like it. If for no other reason, watch it for Malden and that wonderfully dark ending.