A Blade in the Dark

Normally, whenever I have a movie that I want to talk about, I will generally have it as part of a review for Metal Psalter, the metal music webzine I write for. You see, Metal Psalter also does movie reviews, and I have done a couple of such reviews for them, and unlike the music that I have to review, I have no limits on how recent the movies have to be for a review.

The movie that I want to talk about A Blade in the Dark is being written here solely because I don't have the movie in my collection to watch. Otherwise, it would get the full review treatment. Having said that, on to the movie.

A Blade in the Dark was a film directed by Lamberto Bava, who is the son of famed Italian film director Mario Bava. The general premise of the movie is that Bruno moves into a house, where he is trying to put together a music score for a movie that his director friend is putting together. When a couple of murders take place within the property where he is staying, it is up to Bruno to figure out not only who is doing the killing, but also find out the secret that is hidden within the house that he is inhabiting.

Aside from the usual lapses in logic, such as when one of the women gets scared of a spider while hiding in the closet, and according to the dialogue, it wasn't a spider, yet when the camera pans to the creature, it is in fact, a spider. The killing of that woman a few minutes later is pretty weak, as it is pretty much a box cutter cutting into the stomach followed by a cutting of the throat. Besides that, the killings are pretty fantastic, with the highlight being the director getting strangled with movie film. Not gory, mind you, but irony at its best.

Overall, A Blade in the Dark has its share of campy moments, with some fairly serious moments thrown in. In some ways, it is a rather typical giallo, as it becomes a whodunit type of movie with some pretty fantastic gory scenes and some slick camera work. Some inconsistencies with the storyline make it hard to keep a straight face while watching the movie, but it knows to keep things lighthearted when they are needed.