AMUCK! (1972)

 

Written & Directed By: Silvio Amadio

Cinematography: Aldo Giordani

Editor: Antonio Siciliano 

Cast: Farley Granger, Barbara Bouchet, Rosalba Neri, Umberto Raho, Patrizia Viotti, Dino Mele, Petsr Martinovitch, Nino Segurini

The secretary of a writer and his wife investigates the disappearance of her lover - their previous secretary - and finds herself the target of the couple's erotic desires and a murder plot.

When it comes to older foreign films, especially let’s say Italian or Spanish. They truly encapsulate and showcase culture going through a transition at the time, trying to be as modern as the times that the film was made, but also still having a classic-looking feel. 

The female characters always dress well and in style. The protagonists are usually sexy and beautiful. With homosexual activity or seduction. It is surprising some of these films as they are more explicit than some of the films coming out today, which are supposedly more open-minded. Which then makes the scenes like these sexy though a bit more fetishistic.

Especially here as many scenes have a slow motion softcore scenes that are quite revealing and usually same-sex. There are quite a few that make the film at times feel like it’s more lesbian erotica with a plot, with gorgeous women. Not necessarily regular or ordinary-looking women. It offers a distraction or entertainment. As the film has a mystery at its heart, though you know who is guilty, the only question is how or why.

Though shot more for a male viewing audience as it has that day through it, most of the women appear naked or topless, and all seem to have great voluptuous bodies and petite frames.

Though the erotica is more in the first half, making it seem like the film will be a sexual liberation movie most of the time. The second half becomes mortgage, dramatic, and fashionable, yet slows down and becomes dull and not quite as titillating or flashy.

One wishes that there was more mystery to the whole endeavor. Which is at heart a giallo 

Barbara Bouchet looks so incredible that you can barely take your eyes off of her throughout. Except when co-star Rosena Neri Osnon screens who has the more dangerous-haired look. Whereas Bouchet is the innocent, Neri is the liberated wild card.

Ultimately, the film feels like more of a tease with nudity rather than too much action. The action that there is is more exploitative than Romantic, leaving a more will they are won’t they question in the minds of the audience rather than any real or threat of violence.

One of the few strengths of the film is the rather surprising ending, though an explanation more than anything else, and perfectly unpredictable as no one in the audience would have guessed it.

More to look at if you admire the female form and how it’s filmed, kind of like a film filled with beautiful bombshells and a weak mystery.

Grade: C+