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Death Laid an Egg

Original title: La morte ha fatto l'uovo
  • 1968
  • 1h 26m
IMDb RATING
5.8/10
1.9K
YOUR RATING
Death Laid an Egg (1968)
The depraved manager of a high-tech poultry factory - which is genetically engineering boneless chickens - is pulled into a love triangle with his domineering wife and her sexually-liberated cousin, leading to double-crosses and murder.
Play trailer3:54
1 Video
75 Photos
GialloHorrorThriller

The depraved manager of a high-tech poultry factory is pulled into a love triangle with his domineering wife and her sexually-liberated cousin, leading to double-crosses and murder.The depraved manager of a high-tech poultry factory is pulled into a love triangle with his domineering wife and her sexually-liberated cousin, leading to double-crosses and murder.The depraved manager of a high-tech poultry factory is pulled into a love triangle with his domineering wife and her sexually-liberated cousin, leading to double-crosses and murder.

  • Director
    • Giulio Questi
  • Writers
    • Franco Arcalli
    • Giulio Questi
  • Stars
    • Gina Lollobrigida
    • Jean-Louis Trintignant
    • Ewa Aulin
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • IMDb RATING
    5.8/10
    1.9K
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Giulio Questi
    • Writers
      • Franco Arcalli
      • Giulio Questi
    • Stars
      • Gina Lollobrigida
      • Jean-Louis Trintignant
      • Ewa Aulin
    • 33User reviews
    • 63Critic reviews
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • Videos1

    Trailer
    Trailer 3:54
    Trailer

    Photos75

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    Top cast25

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    Gina Lollobrigida
    Gina Lollobrigida
    • Anna
    Jean-Louis Trintignant
    Jean-Louis Trintignant
    • Marco
    • (as Jean Louis Trintignant)
    Ewa Aulin
    Ewa Aulin
    • Gabrielle
    Jean Sobieski
    • Mondaini
    Renato Romano
    Renato Romano
    • Luigi
    Vittorio André
    Giulio Donnini
    • Hotel Manager
    Biagio Pelligra
    • Chemical operator
    Cleofe Del Cile
    • Prostitute #1
    Monica Millesi
    Ugo Adinolfi
    Conrad Andersen
    Aldo Bonamano
    • Police Inspector
    Rina De Filippo
    Livio Ferraro
    Mario Guizzardi
    Margherita Horowitz
    • Marco's secretary
    Barbara Pignaton
    • Director
      • Giulio Questi
    • Writers
      • Franco Arcalli
      • Giulio Questi
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    User reviews33

    5.81.9K
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    Featured reviews

    6I_Ailurophile

    Great music, curious ideas, overly disjointed plot development

    Let's be honest, the very title and premise are so wildly curious as to almost demand viewership; it's billed as a thriller, but expectations just go right out the window. The opening minutes don't do much to help form a concrete notion: between Bruno Maderna's excellent, vibrant score, unnerving in its emphatic discordance, and the wealth of imagery to greet us in short order, it's hard to know just what it is we've committed to watching - yet also hard not to be invested in the bizarrerie. As the narrative starts to take shape a more clear notion forms of what 'Death laid an egg' is about. Though in the broad strokes it may fit squarely into a classic Italian genre, and there are distinct difficulties with the feature as it presents, it's still suitably intriguing and engaging to be worth exploring on its own merits.

    About those problems, though. As much as the movie works to catch our attention at the very start, it feels a little bit as though it's compensating for plot development that's meager and unbothered as the story first picks up. And that continues to hold true - a persistent swing of the pendulum between arresting imagery and audio, and mundane and gradual advancement of the story. Ultimately I think the back and forth between one end of the spectrum and another means we get roughly equal amounts of both - but that doesn't mean the picture is perfectly balanced. Because by the same token, Franco Arcalli's sharp, brisk editing helps to reinforce the near phantasmagoric audiovisual overload, maintain the overall pace, and build tension and suspense. Yet much of the sequencing comes across as disordered, furthering the sense of imbalance, and even incoherence, as a variety of story ideas are introduced that seem peculiarly disparate. For that matter, I believe the narrative is complete, but it struggles to even feel cohesive: some small included scenes only heighten the confusion, and maybe I just blinked at the exact wrong time, but there's also a lack of clarity in some regards.

    What it comes down to is that 'Death laid an egg' tries very hard to give us a veritable cacophony of light and sound, and it succeeds in that aim. The trouble is that this choice serves to chop the plot into a deeply fragmented construction - yet without that fundamental flair, at its roots the plot is actually quite ordinary and unremarkable. Some aspects of it frankly feel altogether contrived. What we have is an issue of overwhelming style taking precedence over merely serviceable substance, and there's no great victory possible in the midst of that dichotomy. It's not that this is outright bad - not at all! I do admire the endeavor, and the gumption to fashion a story in this way. There are a few noteworthy names in the cast, and I think everyone turns in fine, nuanced displays of acting. The production design, art direction, and all manner of contributions from behind the scenes all look great generally, even when some elements fail to wholly comport. Giulio Questi demonstrates capable skills as director, and there are some splendid bits and pieces of ideas in the screenplay he wrote with Franco Arcalli.

    Somehow, though, when all is said and done, much of the value gets subsumed by the kaleidoscopic film-making and storytelling. Unorthodox craft works well for many titles, yet the method must not overshadow the content as it does here. I do like 'Death laid an egg' more than I don't, but I wish I liked it more - and just as it was curiosity that drew me in at the start, having watched, curiosity may remain the best reason to check it out. It's duly recommendable for a number of reasons - fans of giallo, or the cast; appreciation of atypical movie-making or narratives, or of brilliant, memorable music. By whatever means one discovers 'Death laid an egg,' however, potential viewers should just keep in mind that one way or another it's not quite the viewing experience it inherently submits itself to be.
    8crystallogic

    Chicken dance

    I like how experimental some of these early gialli are. This is another movie about kind of spoiled rich people playing games with each other and getting into sordid trouble. Murder is involved, but not in the way you'd think after seeing the first half of the film, and I think that's one of the clever things about it. The story is more engaging than some, and, for once, actually more involving than set pieces, of which they are few (no prolonged stalking/murder sequences or anything like that).

    Also, the movie is really funny at times, and I think it's absolutely intentional. The scene with the PR guy and all his "chicken poses" is priceless and like something you might find in a Monty Python sketch. I think there's some nice satire here of the rich industrial class, and a political subtext about automation and workers' rights. You see this sort of thing in vintage Italian genre films sometimes, and it's nice to see that sometimes, a thriller isn't just a thriller, if you know what I mean.

    Finally, this is a slightly experimental film, with lots of fast edits and artistic scene transitions that often tell you things that aren't explicit in dialogue or scene itself. Also, the music -- I think it's great, in all its clanging and banging around and discordance, but it definitely won't be to everyon'e staste. A tip from my partner: "if you imagine a chicken playing the music, it becomes a thousand times better".
    6parry_na

    A quirky giallo production ...

    Very odd to see genre beauties Ewa Aulin and Gina Lollobrigida brandishing dead chickens, but this giallo goes out of its way to perplex and stupefy us, thanks to director and co-writer Giulio Questi's vision. The music, usually sweeping and inviting in these kind of films, is a series of tuneless flourishes here, as if Bruno Maderna had been instructed to provide anything as long as it wasn't melodic.

    I found 'Death Laid an Egg' too 60s-kitsch-quirky to become completely involved in, although Ms Aulin is ridiculously cute throughout. The story is a thin one, and engages mainly because of the performances. My score is 6 out of 10.
    Dethcharm

    "Playboy Poultry In Smoking Jackets! At A Poultry Party!"...

    Sort of an absurdist giallo, DEATH LAID AN EGG is about wealthy chicken farm owners, Anna (Gina Lollobrigida), her husband Marco (Jean Louis Trintignant), and their secretary, Gabrielle (Ewa Aulin). Life on the farm is blissful, in spite of Marco and Gabrielle's affair. Of course, neither of the women know that Marco is a serial killer.

    Indeed, this is a strange, trippy film, bordering on the psychedelic. The "experimental" music soundtrack -which sounds a lot like someone slamming their face into a piano, while torturing a hyena with a violin- is reminiscent of that heard in A QUIET PLACE IN THE COUNTRY.

    A perfect example of EGG's lunatic charm comes during a party, where the participants pile all of the furniture into the middle of the living room, and take turns entering another room in order to be "totally honest". This, having something to do with human / chicken behavior (!).

    Anyone expecting a straightforward, logical story line might find this to be an excruciating experience. Aside from all of the 60's flash, it suffers from extreme tedium.

    However, poultry lovers will rejoice aloud, as our feathered friends are featured quite prominently throughout! Beware of the hideous, pulsating, wingless, headless, mutant, monster chickens! Their gushy deaths will haunt you forever!...
    lazarillo

    "Diabolique" on acid (and with a lot of chickens)

    Like many other European thrillers this early Italian giallo was obviously very influenced by the French film "Diabolique" with it's basic plot of a wealthy husband, wife, and mistress all scheming against each other. And like the later film "So Sweet, So Perverse" the movie throws another man (Jean Sorel)into the mix as a kind of a fourth side to the main triangle. This movie is no conventional thriller, however. For one thing it has kind of psychedelic, surrealist pop-art late 60's sensibility to it that always threatens to overwhelm (and occasionally does) the rational story-line. For another thing, it has a VERY bizarre setting, a fully-automated chicken plant. (There's a scene where the scientists at the plant create "monster" chickens without wings or beaks that really makes one want to swear off poultry for life). This unusual setting adds a whole industrial conspiracy angle and, moreover, a weird sort of social commentary to the proceedings.

    The acting is all very good. Jean-Louis Tritigant plays a similar role to the one he'd later play in "So Sweet, So Perverse", but here he also might be a serial killer who is offing prostitutes in a roadside motel. Latin sex symbol Gina Lollabridga makes a rare appearance in this kind of film (which is actually much more entertaining than some of the bigger-budgeted movies she starred in)as the domineering wife. The young mistress is believably played by Ewa "Candy" Aulin, although she is not quite as enjoyable when she's not naked and not speaking in her natural (undubbed) heavy Swedish accent. (Aulin also appeared in another excellent, if even more obscure, giallo called "The Double"). The best thing about the movie though is the ending where EVERYBODY manages to get their just desserts--and then some. Definitely check this one out.

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    Related interests

    Jacopo Mariani in Deep Red (1975)
    Giallo
    Mia Farrow in Rosemary's Baby (1968)
    Horror
    Cho Yeo-jeong in Parasite (2019)
    Thriller

    Storyline

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    Did you know

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    • Trivia
      This is the second pairing of Jean-Louis Trintignant and Ewa Aulin in a film in the giallo vane, the other being "I Am What I Am" the previous year.
    • Goofs
      In the first slasher scene, the knife blade doesn't show any blood till after 7 slashes.
    • Quotes

      Anna: Honest women have got to dress like prostitutes and surprise their husbands in order to keep them. What good is a woman who can't hold onto her husband? She's got to fight for him! It's worth fighting for, isn't it?

    • Connections
      Featured in Ultimate Poliziotteschi Trailer Shoot-Out (2017)

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    FAQ14

    • How long is Death Laid an Egg?Powered by Alexa
    • can someone at IMDB look at photos 4 5 6 7 8 and tell me what film they are from? they are not death laid an egg

    Details

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    • Release date
      • January 9, 1968 (Italy)
    • Countries of origin
      • Italy
      • France
    • Language
      • Italian
    • Also known as
      • Smrt je snijela jaje
    • Filming locations
      • Italy
    • Production companies
      • Summa Cinematografica
      • Cine Azimut
      • Les Films Corona
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Tech specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      • 1h 26m(86 min)
    • Color
      • Color
    • Sound mix
      • Mono
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.85 : 1

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