Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Gi-a-llo: My Dear Killer

Off with his head!  Today's film is My Dear Killer, a Giallo by a one-time delver into the Genre.  The Story starts off with a surprising murder (although, this is a Giallo, so it is not *that* surprising) and turns into a bigger Mystery to uncover.  On the case is George Hilton, a man who appeared in quite a number of these films.  He solved The Case of the Scorpion's Tail.  He faced down The Blade of the Ripper.  He saw All The Colors of the Dark.  Hell, he even faced The Raiders From Atlantis (or The Atlantis Interceptors).  Can he solve this case?  He will have to deal with a secretive family, an anonymous Killer and a less than helpful Boss.  Even though this film is about twice the age of most people who may read the Site, I won't SPOIL everything.  After all, it is a Mystery Film (of sorts)!  To find out why you may want to see or avoid this one, read on...
In the great opening, a man hires someone with an excavator to...um, excavate.  However, the man decides to grab him, lift his body in the air and wait until his head comes off of his body!

Hilton and company are on the case.  Quick- find the guy hired to do th job!
...he won't be much help.

On the plus side, this sure was an easy case.  The End.
No, of course not.  Could you imagine if that was really The End?

Hilton and company question how easily this came about and keep investigating.  They speak to people related to the (first) victim to find some clues.
To add some intrigue, Hilton's Detective is by no means perfect.  He has a tumultuous home life that will either help or hinder the Case.  I'm going with the latter.
Meanwhile, the Killer strikes again as the Wife of the original Victim is set up for a kill!  Black glove of death!
In the other famous moment from the film, he/she attacks another possible Witness/source of information in her home with a Black and Decker Saw.

Black and Decker- for all your murdering needs!
As the bodies continue to pile up, the Police have to find out who the killer is!
Hilton finds a key piece of evidence...but needs to keep the killer from getting it from this lady first.  Can he do it?
I won't SPOIL the Ending here, although feel free to look it up yourself.  It is not mind-blowing, but it was good.  The End.
A Giallo with a less-silly Title, but it also turned out to be good.  There really are three types of Giallo out there.  There are your Good to Average ones like this, Black Belly of the Tarantula and The Cat O'Nine Tails.  There are the really silly and/or terrible ones like Your Vice is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key or Seven Deaths in the Cat's Eye.  Lastly, there are the truly great ones like Tenebre, Phenomena and The Bird With the Crystal Plumage.  I suppose there are some great ones NOT made by Dario Argento too (like Blood and Black Lace).  This is the first one.  The Story is not mind-blowing, the presentation is not the best and the whole thing is not revolutionary.  If you have not seen Giallo, this is a pretty good introduction.  It has some shocking kills, but is not as bloody or salacious as others.  If you think that you have seen every Giallo there is to see, check this one out too.  If nothing else, it shows you that newspaper headlines were just as salacious then as they are now...
Up next, I cover a weird Import film on Streaming.  Will it be the midget Cowboy, drunken Irishmen or dancing Indians?  Stay tuned...

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