Diary entries forKill, Baby... Kill!
Kill, Baby... Kill!
“You wouldn't understand the people who live here. Everyone knows there's a curse over them” “It's a chain of bloodshed that there's no use trying to break” Not Bava's best, scariest, or goriest, but certainly feels like his most tense entry (at least that I've seen so far in his filmography). Great gothic vibes, great tense scenes, and even great nightmarish sequences; particularly love the second half descent into chaos, including Giacomo Rossi-Stuart running through an eternal room, eventually catching up to himself
Kill, Baby... Kill!
The Mario Bava Challenge (http://letterboxd.com/butch_cassidy/list/mario-bava-challenge/) Mario Bava isn't forgetting when it comes to setting up a potentially chilling tale. It's promised through the terrifying amount of blood-curdling screams in the beginning of Kill, Baby... Kill!. And these cries are shrieked from a young and scared shitless woman, fleeing an unknown presence that unfortunately leads to death: plunging a few feet onto the knifelike points of a fence and appearing as a human kebab! Ouch. In a promising intro, Bava has done two great things: 1. Initiated the mystery and 2. Deployed the very first kill. It's short and sweet but effective nonetheless. He then throws in our protagonist, Doctor Paul Eswai, a perceptive looking chap who arrives by coach in a small village with the intention of giving an autopsy to the dead girl. He has his suitcase and everything. In the few minutes it takes him to reach the inn, the deadened stare of the mysterious 19th century village forebodes the screen. And when a gold coin is found stuck in the victim's heart during autopsy, bad vibes sink in all around. The shocks are everywhere. A little girl stalks the movie, whether it be the unsettling giggles in the background or a hand on the window. Her distressing presence is quite terrifying and a grappling momentum in the investing story. The fear in a victim's eyes are epitomized by the feeling of paranoia, knowing that noticing this little girl is pretty much seeing the videotape in The Ring. The local witch is an alluring one too. She scares off two men from attacking the Doctor with a simple "STOP!", justifying herself as a curious and possibly trustworthy figure. There's a set of camera zooms introduced in a kung fu-like manner, quite noticeably with the burgomeister who genuinely looks like he should at least absurdly widen and flutter the movements of his mouth. The cinematography comes to a better understandment later in the use of an ominous graveyard and a spiral staircase. It's an appealing way to ignore the film's slip ups. The character of the Doctor merely changes nature; he's firm but never dominant, hardly unstable, and appears very effortless overall. The plot also seems distracted at moments. It doesn't do extremely well in telling a consistently immersing story but nevertheless has its moments of wow; the spiral staircase scene is a nicely paced occasion that's a sensation to watch. In my view, Black Sunday is the preferable Bava gothic-horror. I'm still yet to view Black Sabbath, and a handful of others. I can say I have terribly high hopes for them after seeing the enjoyable Kill, Baby... Kill!.
Kill, Baby... Kill!
Found the resolution to be a little weak; wish they had expanded on it a bit more cuz baroness lore is interesting but doesn’t get enough time in the story to breathe. Idk, if they had interwoven it a little, maybe I would’ve liked it more? Love the cinematography tho; the set design, setting, blocking and the beautiful grain make the film look like a painting specially the cemetery background. Liked the dolly ins / zoom ins and swing-motion-imitation camera movement Now I’ll stop mixing this up with Alice, Sweet Alice
