Il Rosso segno della follia (1970)
Also known as "Hatchet for the Honeymoon, Un' Accetta per la luna di miele, An Axe for the Honeymoon, Blood Brides, Un Hacha para la luna de miel, The Red Mark of Madness, The Red Sign of Madness"
Starring: Steven Forsyth, Dagmar Lassander, Laura Betti, Jesús Puente, Femi Benussi, Antonia Mas, Alan Collin, Gérard Tichy, Verónica Llimera, Pasquale Fortunato, José Ignacio Abadal, Silvia Lienas, Montserat Riva, Guido Berlocci
Director: Mario Bava
Running Time: 85 minutes
US MPAA rating: N/AUK BBFC rating: 15
Comedy, Fantasy, Horror, Thriller
On DVD In Italy, sensationalist thriller novels were published with yellow (or 'giallo') covers, and so films inspired by their lurid subject matter became known as 'gialli'. Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci may be its best known exponents, but they, like so many American directors, were in thrall to the undisputed father of the giallo, Mario Bava, who established all the subgenre's groundrules in films like 'Black Sunday', 'Blood and Black Lace', and 'Lisa and the Devil', with his characteristic eye for rich detail and his extraordinary powers of manipulation. 'Hatchet for the Honeymoon' represents something of a deviation from the normal conventions of the giallo. Instead of featuring the usual black-gloved killer whose identity is carefully concealed until the end, the cleaver-wielding John Harrington (Steven Forsyth) is seen doing his murderous work right from the opening scene, and his voice-over reveals candidly "I am a madman, a dangerous killer...I have killed five young women, three of whom are buried in the hothouse".
The dandyish John exploits his ownership of a Parisian wedding salon to kill brides on their wedding night - with each murder bringing him closer to remembering the circumstances of his own mother's violent death, which he witnessed as a boy. For in the tradition of 'Peeping Tom' and
DVD Extras: Scene selection; choice of Dolby 2.0/5.1 surround/dts; 'Dario Argento - an Eye for Horror' (57min) - an excellent featurette on the life and works of Argento narrated by Mark Kermode, and including interviews with Argento, his ex-wife/muse Daria Nicolodi, his daughters/muses Fiore and Asia ("[he] never killed me once but he had me raped a few times") and his brother/producer Claudio, with his biographers Alan Jones and Maitland McDonagh, with his actors Michael Brandon ('Four Flies on Grey Velvet'), Jessica Harper ('Suspiria') and Piper Laurie ('Trauma'), with his composers Claudio Simonetti and Keith Emerson, with directors John Carpenter, George A. Romero, William Lustig and Luigi Cozzi, with gore wizard Tom Savini, and with überfan Alice Cooper - all very fascinating, even if only tangentially related to Mario Bava (who gets only one passing mention); trailer; bio of Bava; film notes; photo gallery.
It's Got: Mothers, marriage, madness and murder; paranoia and the paranormal; exquisite sets (including General Franco's villa in Barcelona); brilliantly executed cinematography and editing; a very black streak of humour.
It Needs: More of a surprise to its ending.
Alternatives: Halloween, Psycho, 'Maniac', 'Peeping Tom', 'So I Married an Axe Murderer'
Summary: Perhaps not Bava's best, but this influential psychosexual thriller of matrimonials and madness still runs (wedding) rings around much of the competition.
Review Date: 14th August 2004
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External Links
Il Rosso segno della follia at the IMDB
