Taking place in a miniworld of bad haircuts and awful dressing trends, 'Torso' is a terribly narrated and bad acted movie whose only merits rely on artsy environment and occasional stylish direction. Anyone calling this a giallo is completely missing the point, because all the common places of giallo are missing here. This movie is nothing more than an exploitative bodycount in the vein of any European 70s movie. In fact, this could be the epitome of "blood and tits". Well, way more tits than blood.
Two adjectives that shape this movie are "silly" and "embarrasing". I'll start the dissection.
The director shows a striking inability to tell the story properly. It takes 30 minutes to introduce all the characters, and many of them are thrown in to fill the quota of possible suspects. There are lots of irrelevant roles. The story takes twists too, but in the most unfocused way imaginable. I got the feeling the story wasn't written when the shooting started.
On the funny side, the movie shows no shame in displaying the most cheesy images I've seen in ages: silly hippies, ugly rednecks in their rural world... The embarrassment goes on with the painfully exploitative scenes. Most notably, nude scenes. It's so blatant you'll blush. Some character reactions are indescribably dumb too. This flick will be a hard time for people who get easily embarrassed, and a hell of a good one for the cheap "blood and tits" lover. The gore is seductive, but FX are on the lowest level of all.
I bet Sergio Martino knows a thing or two about film-making, because it shows every now and then, but this cheese fest is not the right opportunity to display his talent. Such bad actors, such lousy dialogue, such incompetent storytelling cannot make it into a good movie. Who is actually the main character here? What's the use of the street seller? What about the opening credits? Some happenings border on impossible, the end with the killer's expository dialogue made me laugh. The movie gives birth to a new acception of the word "unexpected", but in the less "Psycho (by Hitchcock)" way. Only for fetish lovers of italo trash. Like me? I thought so, but this lacks so much quality...
RATING: 3.1
Two adjectives that shape this movie are "silly" and "embarrasing". I'll start the dissection.
The director shows a striking inability to tell the story properly. It takes 30 minutes to introduce all the characters, and many of them are thrown in to fill the quota of possible suspects. There are lots of irrelevant roles. The story takes twists too, but in the most unfocused way imaginable. I got the feeling the story wasn't written when the shooting started.
On the funny side, the movie shows no shame in displaying the most cheesy images I've seen in ages: silly hippies, ugly rednecks in their rural world... The embarrassment goes on with the painfully exploitative scenes. Most notably, nude scenes. It's so blatant you'll blush. Some character reactions are indescribably dumb too. This flick will be a hard time for people who get easily embarrassed, and a hell of a good one for the cheap "blood and tits" lover. The gore is seductive, but FX are on the lowest level of all.
I bet Sergio Martino knows a thing or two about film-making, because it shows every now and then, but this cheese fest is not the right opportunity to display his talent. Such bad actors, such lousy dialogue, such incompetent storytelling cannot make it into a good movie. Who is actually the main character here? What's the use of the street seller? What about the opening credits? Some happenings border on impossible, the end with the killer's expository dialogue made me laugh. The movie gives birth to a new acception of the word "unexpected", but in the less "Psycho (by Hitchcock)" way. Only for fetish lovers of italo trash. Like me? I thought so, but this lacks so much quality...
RATING: 3.1