Cold Eyes of Fear

'Cold Eyes Of Fear' starts off well enough. Against a backdrop of Swingin' 60s London a young playboy type "steals" a beautiful Italian girl from her elderly date and suggests she comes back to his place for some good times. "His place" being owned by his father, a rich and respected solicitor. Unfortunately a couple of criminals have plans of their own, one for money, the other for revenge, and the lovers end up prisoners in a tense siege situation. So far so good. The problem is that you keep waiting for the movie to jump up a notch and it never does. Most giallo I have watched either feature some tasty violence or sex, have some amazing plot twists, or something else really spectacular about them, but 'Cold Eyes Of Fear' just ambles along, and stays on course as a reasonably entertaining thriller, no more, no less. The cast are all okay, the girl (Karin Schubert) is beautiful, and the solicitor is played by the legendary Fernando Rey, best known for his work with Bunuel. The best thing by far about the movie is Morricone's outstanding jazz rock score. If you don't expect much this is pretty good entertainment, but if you want to see some amazing examples of this genre try 'Tenebre' (Argento), 'Don't Torture A Duckling' (Fulci) or 'Autopsy'.

As far as I know this is Enzo Castellari's only venture into the giallo genre, and I'd also heard it wasn't that good. That's not true, and it's barely even a giallo, so maybe I should check my sources or just watch the film. Chocks away!

Sporting incredible sideburns, Gianni Garko is a posh solicitor who quite wisely spends his free time with strippers and hookers who on this occasion takes home an Italian lady. When I say home, I mean his rich uncle's home in a rich part of London. You know, the kind that has a butler in it and a driveway. The Italian lady is playing hard to get even though she's a hooker, and the discovery of the dead butler is a bad enough dampner on the proceedings, so sex totally goes out the window when a gun-toting cockney emerges from the gloom.

He's a kind of 'Alright Guvnor, knees ap Maaver Bhraaan' cockney type but his motivations are not quite clear. Adding to Gianni's woes is his uncle (Fernando Rey), who is a judge and keeps calling to harass him about case files. Fernando sends a policeman over to the house with some files, and while he's trying to whisper that he's being held hostage, the policeman punches him square in the face. Uh-oh! Looks like there's a doings-a-transpiring!

Turns out the copper is the head bad guy which isn't much of a surprise seeing as he's played by Frank Wolff. Frank's motivations aren't quite clear but he does mention quite early on that he's wired Fernando Rey's office to blow up the moment he opens his door, so now the game is on for Gianni to free himself and the hooker, get rid of Frank and his partner, and save Fernando in the nick of time. Either that or he can just have a lot of punch ups while the hooker plays mind games with the two of them.

As this is one of those films that could almost be a stage play in terms of limited set and characters, Enzo's usual hyperactivity makes sure that things don't get boring, so he throws in loads of jarring editing techniques, unusual camera angles (like filming Gianni through the bottom of a jug of icy water he's having his head forced into, or through those finger holes you used to get on telephones), loads of twists (even the cockney becomes unsure of Frank's motives), and an overly violent ending just to cap things off.

Although Fernando Rey shouts down the phone a lot and doesn't do much else, Frank and Gianni do well in their roles, with Frank constantly mocking Gianni's Eton and 'playing rugger', with Gianni alternating between snivelling wimp and stiff upper lip radge mentalness.

I've never seen an Enzo film I didn't like, so you might want to knock the praise in this review down a bit. Ennio Morricone's freeform jazz soundtrack is a winner too.

This is an average example of the Italian Giallo, the story set in London, switching between a solicitor's office and his stately house, which is occupied by his solicitor nephew and a prostitute.

The plot is fairly good, involving an elaborate revenge on the elder solicitor for a wrongful judgement some years earlier. This film has some good twists but is tense only at times. It seems to drag and much more could have been made of the frightful atmosphere in the house. Instead, we have over-used extreme close-ups and plenty of screaming and shouting.

Not a bad film by any means, but there are plenty better examples of the genre.

This is one of the weakest Italian thrillers I've seen. It's a giallo/house-invasion hybrid but it doesn't really succeed in either genre. The film begins like a typical giallo with an opening credit sequence following a car through the streets of London to a Morricone soundtrack; this is followed by a textbook giallo stalk scene which, somewhat bizarrely, turns out to be a stage show. Up to this point the movie is perfectly serviceable but really, this is as good as it gets. The majority of the remainder of the film is about a lawyer and a prostitute who are held captive by a couple of bad guys. And, to be perfectly honest, they don't get up to anything very interesting.

Unlike other weak giallos, like Slaughter Hotel for example, this movie neither delivers much sleaze or is photographed particularly attractively. And the score, while being a stronger aspect of the film, is basically Morricone-by-numbers. However, there is some fun to be had with the ridiculous dubbing, which makes the actors appear that they cannot act for toffee; and the guy called Quill has a very very silly accent. No one in the U.K. talks like this trust me.

Overall, I'm not sure who I can recommend this to. Fans of giallos will find it too unsuspenseful and uninvolving and those who like house invasion movies will not find it anywhere sleazy enough. At best it offers a few laughs and some semi-inventive scenes. But really, it's not very good.

I recently watched the Italian thriller 🇮🇹 Cold Eyes of Fear (1971) on Tubi. The story centers on a wealthy family led by the father, a successful lawyer. In an attempt to irritate his father, the son brings home a beautiful, ordinary woman for a weekend fling. But his plans take a dark turn when a man his father once sent to prison shows up seeking revenge.

Directed by Enzo G. Castellari (Escape from the Bronx), the film stars Giovanna Ralli (Deadfall), Frank Wolff (Once Upon a Time in the West), Fernando Rey (The French Connection), and Karin Schubert (The Panther Squad).

This film leans more toward a whodunit thriller than a traditional giallo or Italian horror. However, it incorporates familiar elements from those genres. The acting is somewhat stiff at times, and dramatic moments often feature prolonged close-ups and lingering stares, which became unintentionally funny after a while. Still, the cast interacts well, and the film offers the expected mix of attractive female leads, nudity, and sex scenes.

The action sequences, particularly for the time, are well done, with some impressive fight scenes, though there aren't enough of them to build real tension or make the stakes feel high. Unfortunately, the ending is anticlimactic and doesn't quite live up to the build-up.

Overall, Cold Eyes of Fear is unremarkable and lacks enough engaging content to recommend. I'd score it a 4/10 and suggest skipping it.