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Friday, February 26, 2010

A Lizard in a well-worn skin

3:22 PM / Cinema / 1 Comment

I'm off to the Glasgow Film Festival tomorrow afternoon to meet up with some of the Dark Dreams crowd and catch screenings of Lucio Fulci's A LIZARD IN A WOMAN'S SKIN and Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani's AMER.

With a declared running time of 110 minutes, this screening of A LIZARD IN A WOMAN'S SKIN would appear to be at least five minutes longer than the current longest available version, the remastered US DVD from Media Blasters/Shriek Show. So I can report back in something approaching a meaningful way on what (if anything) is new, I rewatched my copy of the film yesterday. (I also happen to be writing about it for the chapter of my PhD that I'm currently working on, so I was killing two birds with one stone.) I've seen it countless times now, and it still holds up extremely well, in my opinion remaining Fulci's best film. Yes, I know most people seem to prefer DON'T TORTURE A DUCKLING, but I've always found that one a bit more sluggish and grubby-looking, if considerably more daring in terms of its social commentary. (Think about it too hard, and you'll find that A LIZARD IN A WOMAN'S SKIN is basically just telling you that hippies and lesbians are a menace to civilised society... although, of course, as per usual with the giallo, "civilised" society turns out to be anything but.)

For me, A LIZARD IN A WOMAN'S SKIN proves once and for all that Fulci was a great director, making his fall from grace in the 80s all the more tragic. He was also very much ahead of his time, anticipating stylistic trends years if not decades before they became mainstream. Look at his innovative use of hand-held photography and rapid-fire editing to illustrate Carol Hammond's fractured state of mind, or the split-screen effects (also used to notable effect in his earlier, underrated ONE ON TOP OF THE OTHER) as he contrasts the Hammonds' dinner party, the feeling of repression in the air positively stifling, with the uninhibited wildness of Julia Durer's party next door. (And of course there's Carol's stepdaughter, Joan, covertly tapping her foot to the jazzy music, courtesy of Ennio Morricone, seeping through the walls - a nicely understated hint towards the restlessness bubbling away beneath the family's superficially "respectable" surface.)

And what a cast! Florinda Bolkan, Jean Sorel, Anita Strindberg, Ely Galleani, Silvia Monti, George Rigaud, Alberto de Mendoza... virtually everyone who was anybody on the 70s Italian genre scene is here in some capacity (well, barring George Hilton and Edwige Fenech, I suppose). And, of course, let's not forget Stanley Baker and Leo Genn (dryly hilarious as the slightly oddball police inspector) keeping up a stiff upper lip on the British side. It helps that this by far the best dubbed giallo I've ever scene, with the English language track (recorded at Pinewood Studios) good enough to almost pass for the real thing, despite the fact that pretty much only Baker and Genn were speaking with their own voices.

A great Fulci, a great giallo and a great film. I look forward to seeing this on the big screen tomorrow with great anticipation.

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