The Unnaturals

Just a waste of time. Poor Marianne Koch, after that beautiful role, Marisol in "A Fistful of Dollars", here she has an embarrassing one, the whole movie is embarrassing.

A rich old man and his greedy group of hangers-on get stranded in the middle of nowhere when their car breaks down (in a thunderstorm, of course) and the motley crew make their way to an old dark house where they interrupt a seance that reveals their deadly secrets...

What's basically an Agatha Christie murder mystery set in the Roaring Twenties gets all supernatural in the last ten minutes but it's too little too late for anyone expecting a horror film. Although flashbacks help open things up, it's still a "drawing room whodunit" at heart with nice period detail (except for the hairdos) and a bit more style than usual for this sort of thing. The (brief) sex scenes are lesbian (were they "the unnaturals"?) but not erotic and the movie's nothing to get excited about, either, despite its reputation as one of the director's best.

The Unnaturals takes place in England circa the roaring '20s (or the late-'60s, judging by the women's hairstyles): after their car gets stuck in mud during a thunderstorm, a group of people take shelter at a nearby house, home to Uriat (Peter Lorre-alike Luciano Pigozzi) and his mother (Marianne Leibl), who is in a trance as a result of a seance being interrupted by the visitors. In order to try and bring the woman back from the 'other dimension', the guests agree to complete the seance, during which their darkest secrets are revealed.

Despite plenty of treachery, murder and a little gratuitous lesbianism (very tame by today's standards), Antonio Margheriti's The Unnaturals is quite a tedious affair, hampered by leaden pacing, a confusing narrative structure (there are quite a number of flashbacks), too much talk, and a predictable ending: my guess that the characters were all ghosts wasn't too wide of the mark. Some say that this film is one of Margheriti's best, but I much preferred Castle of Blood and Cannibal Apocalypse (hell, Killer Fish is preferable to this one).

To be fair there were some fine moments in this, particularly towards the end, when we actually get to see the action that has been thus far only talked about. Also despite prim early scenes we suddenly get solid girl on girl scenes, one verging on the non consensual, which is unusual. Also as the film climaxes we do get some great shots of eyes, giallo style, wide and fearful but by then it has been a long time coming. Again I have to confess the early scene in the woods in the storm is very well done but once we get to the house (yes, old dark house style) things do begin to drag. There are flashbacks to another big house but it does nothing to relieve the tedium of this extremely wordy piece. Card games, a prolonged seance sequence - are you getting excited, no, not me either. Real shame because everybody performs well, there is good photography and there are enough great moments to make one wish there had been just a few more. The low score is in part to remind me that I would not want to see this again and not that this is completely without merit.

Pros: Fantastic gothic atmosphere. Dark and stormy night. Creepy house in the forest. A group of haunted people participate in a seance. I enjoyed the camerawork and direction by Antonio Margheriti. Some of the moving shots helped keep the film engaging. There is a good amount of old-fashioned suspense here. Marianne Koch shines in the cast.

Cons: I thought the ending ultimately took away from the events that proceeded it. I didn't like it. There is a homophobic depiction of bisexual or lesbian woman. I didn't like that either. There are a number of flashbacks throughout the film. Some of them help the film, but some of them derail the momentum of the central story.

At the end of the day, it's worth a watch if you're a fan of these things, but the average viewer can skip this one.