The Double

This is all most enjoyable if insubstantial. It looks good and sounds good throughout. Jean Sorel effective, as ever, without seeming to put himself too far out. Just a raised eyebrow is often all he needs to do to convey to us his thinking. Bit bewildering at times with much flashing back and forth but the two ladies help, both Lucie Bose and Ewa Aulin as mother and daughter are easy on the eye, in and out of their clothes. Many films of this time had prolonged sequences somewhere in them where half naked lovers ran along a beach or galloped horses in the surf or ran into sunlight through cornfields but this film, at times, seems to consist of just those dreamy (but insignificant) moments.

I can only be honest and make it absolutely clear: I find Ewa Aulin completely cute and stunning to look at. Even the voice dubbed on top of hers doesn't compromise that. Jean Sorel as Giovanni, whose recollections make up the bulk of this film, is a classically good looking gentleman. As a couple, however, Giovanni and Lucia share a tempestuous, jealous relationship. And that is what takes up most of the plot.

Despite the appealing quality of these two performers, their various dalliances aren't quite as interesting to watch as the writers seem to think, although Romolo Guerrieri's direction lifts it into a somewhat dream-like state. But the various liaisons are virtually all that happens. The main thrust of interest involves how Giovanni ends up in the predicament he's enduring when we first encounter him at the beginning of the film.

Despite the wafer-thin plot, this is as breezy, if undemanding, entry into the giallo genre - mainly because of the appeal of the two main players. My score is 5 out of 10.

A man called Giovanni is shot in an underground car park by an ominous old man. The rest of the story is told in disjointed flashbacks that piece together the scenario that resulted in this situation arising. It turns out that Giovanni is an idle playboy who has affair with his young wife's mother while holidaying in Morocco. The mother ends up taking up with an American drifter and Giovanni is consumed with jealousy; murder follows.

The Double is a pretty interesting thriller. Its structure is one of the primary reasons why. The way in which scenes are edited together in a non-chronological way gives it a mysterious and dreamlike feel. The soundtrack accentuates this tone, seeing as it's a score that can best be described as breezy. The film benefits from the presence of Jean Sorel as Giovanni. Sorel starred in several gialli from the time and always seems to put in a solid turn. Also of note is Ewa Aulin as Sorel's young wife. Aulin had earlier appeared in the ultra-weird Death Laid an Egg, here she is also good and cute as a button; she even has time for an extended naked underwater swim, which was nice.

This is a good film. It isn't a typical giallo; it's more of a psychological thriller. It's well acted and directed and it isn't particularly predictable. If you like Italian thrillers then you should like this too.

I saw this under the title Love Inferno about five months ago. It begins with a man, Giovanni, being shot in a parking garage. What did he do to deserve this fate? The film flashes back to show how things went wrong for this playboy. While on honeymoon in Africa, Giovanni meets the sexy mother of his (attractive) wife. Since the mother is played by Lucia Bose, I can understand the guy's predicament. The mother-in-law is, needless to say, appalled by the advances of her daughter's new husband and instead takes up with a young hippie type. Jealousy and frustration follow. I was certain where the film was going but turned out to be only partially right. Ewa Aulin, certainly no wallflower either, plays the wife. After only five months, I'm having a hard time remembering much about the film. It was okay but don't expect an erotic thriller - the film is lacking on both counts.

A great admirer of Jean Sorel I watched this unworthy rubbish, and although the mystery of the opening caught my attention the rest of the film did not. Lucia Bose, a long way away from Antonioni, I also admire, but definitely not here. Seeing Sorel I tried to focus on the great actor of ' Sandra ' directed by Visconti, and his role in Bunuel's ' Belle de Jour ' and Bolognini's ' From a Roman Balcony ' and wondered why he had accepted this mess of a scenario. This example of Italian cinema of the beginning of the 1970's showed to me how cinema was beginning to slide down into puerile eroticism (concentrating on the female body and considering the male body to be a substitute for the heterosexual males in the audience), and also into the domain of violence for its own sake with again the males in the audience having fantasies of violence of their own. But to return to the film in detail it has an appalling musical score, flashy and gimmicky camera work, and as I said I watched it for Sorel and yes, there were glimpses of the man who qualified for me as being the best actor of the previous decade. Saddening.