Strip Nude for Your Killer

Strip nude for Your killer must be, for me, the most outrageously sexist giallo ever made. Fair enough, you've got to expect a fair amount of it in these movies(or else you'd be let down) but Andrea Bianchi runs with misogyny ball so far that he leaves the park, gets in a taxi with it, goes to the airport, and throws the ball on a plane to some uncharted island in the pacific.

Which, by the way, makes this film quite entertaining.

After someone kills a doctor who's botched abortion killed his patient, the film shifts focus to a modelling agency and all the suspects/victims therein. Specifically, we get to focus on Magda (Edwige Fenech), a photographer...and Carlo, who is also a photographer. Carlo takes the biscuit as the most sexist Italian movie hero I've laid eyes on. We first see him sexually harassing a young girl (and succeeding!), then he hooks up with Edwige, seemingly immediately moving in to her apartment, moaning about his coffee, and reading the paper while ignoring her. Edwige, for her part, doesn't seem to mind being called stupid, being shouted at, or even throttled. Ah, the innocence of young love.

Oh, and there's some murders too. Our motorcycle-helmeted killer starts working his way through the cast, and I won't really go into much detail about it as it's a giallo, but if you want to see an extremely fat man trying it on with a model, then this is the film for you. Our chicks are there for eye candy, except for the boss of the agency, so of course that makes her a lesbian.

Weirdly, I expected LESS from the director of The Zombie Dead, but here, at least on a technical level, he seems to do a bit better. There's some nice Argento/Bava style cinematography, and the music is what you'd expect. Violence wise it's touch and go, with some nice gore effects but not much carnage. However, clothes fly off without much prompting so you've not got much to worry about there.

Fun stuff...not a top giallo, but I can't help but be impressed.

And, as usual, the ending is jaw-droppingly stupid, and morally questionable.

While "Nude per l'assassino" aka. "Strip Nude For Your Killer" of 1975 is quite far away from being a Giallo-highlight it is definitely a film that any lover of Italian Horror should enjoy, and that is especially recommended to all the friends of the sleazier kind of Giallo. Director Andrea Bianchi, who is probably best known for his gory Zombie flick "Le Notti Del Terrore" (aka. "Burial Ground") of 1981, sure knows how to create some wonderful sleaze, and "Strip Nude For Your Killer" is as wonderfully sleazy as it gets.

Sexy young models, all with exhibitionist tendencies, as well as the other employees of a fashion agency, are targeted by an insane killer. Nothing quite new in the Giallo-genre, of course, but director Bianchi truly delivers with tons of female nudity, delightful perversions and genuine nastiness in this one. The female cast-members, all of which have a tendency to get naked at every occasion, include genre-queen Edwige Fenech, this time with short hair, and ravishing and great as always. Apart from the wonderful Mrs. Fenech, easily the Nr. 1 siren of 70s Eurosleaze, the cast also includes the stunningly beautiful Femi Benussi, who moved her curves through all kinds of Italian cult flicks, such as Mario Bava's "Hatchet for the Honeymoon", Fernando Di Leo's "Manhunt", Luigi Cozzi's "The Killer Must Kill Again" or the strangely amusing Kung-Fu-Western "The Stranger And The Gunfighter" starring Lee Van Cleef. Apart from loads of sleaze the film includes several violent killings, several comical moments, as well as a typically great Giallo atmosphere with a stylish photography and cool score. Overall, "Strip Nude For Your Killer" is probably no must-see, but it is doubtlessly a treat for my fellow Giallo-fans, especially to those who like their Gialli sleazy. Highly recommended!

The sleazy giallo picture here known as "Strip Nude for Your Killer" (1975) is misleadingly titled (no victim of the crazed killer is ever forced to strip; they're usually 3/4 naked to begin with!) but still manages to convey the film's two main selling points--sex and violence, dished out in fairly equal measure. The movie might more accurately have been called "Who's Been Killing the Entire Staff at Milan's Albatross Modeling Agency?" All we know for sure is that it's a leather-clad figure with a biker's helmet, a Darth Vader-like respiration problem, and a fondness for knife slaying. For the ladies in the audience, the picture features Nino Castelnuovo, so fondly remembered from 1964's "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg," still looking hunky here and sporting a perfectly round butt; and for the men, another exquisite appearance from the Queen of Giallo, Edwige Fenech, short-haired here but still quite dee-lish. "Strip Nude" has been directed in a nonstylish, nonflashy manner by Andrea Bianchi. Its plot does hang together, despite the seemingly unavoidable red herrings, though the killer's motivation ultimately proves to be unconvincing (don't even try guessing who the killer is!). There are any number of genuinely suspenseful scenes, though, and the soundtrack, by one Berto Pisano, effectively mixes Euro lounge jazz with a funky theme that suggests the Temps' "Papa Was a Rolling Stone." Of the half dozen or so Edwige Fenech giallos that I've seen recently, this one is by far the bloodiest and sleaziest (just wait till you see the 300+-lb. guy with his blow-up doll!), but still nothing compared to what filmmakers get away with today. The folks at Blue Underground should be thanked for a fine-looking DVD of a true Italian rarity; still, I'd be thanking them more had they supplied some subtitles rather than the lousy dubbing. And oh...was it just my imagination, or was that indeed an anal sex joke that Nino pulls on Edwige at the film's tail end?

Being considered among the sleaziest and least of the gialli – not that surprising given the involvement of director Bianchi, who would later be responsible for MALABIMBA (1979) – had made me forego the opportunity of purchasing this film's Blue Underground DVD (where it was dubbed in English anyway); I've now acquired it in the original language, though with the picture compromised in its case (where the 2.35:1 aspect ratio has been opened up to 1.85:1)! While I can certainly concede it's no hidden gem within this prolific genre (especially since it puts much more emphasis on eroticism than bloodshed), the film proved surprisingly palatable as these things go. As ever, we get a plethora of gorgeous women who are made to fight for their lives against the killer and shed their clothes at every possible opportunity: these include genre stalwarts Edwige Fenech – playing her last such heroine – and Femi Benussi – at her sexiest – as well as Solvi Stubing, later the presenter of a 1980s TV program reviewing then-current films on general release in Italy!; there's also an effective score by Berto Pisano (not one of the major names associated with the giallo style but his work here is nonetheless commendable). The plot is nothing to write home about either, that is to say, overly familiar: a handful of people engaged with a modeling agency are targeted by a manic killer sporting a black leather outfit and with facial features hidden behind a crash helmet; it all seems to be connected with an abortion gone wrong which actually opens the film. Typically, then, we're given the choice of numerous suspects – including Nino Castelnuovo, who makes for a rather unsavory leading man for this type of film (although his foul-mouthed outbursts are highly entertaining) – but the final revelation and accompanying motive aren't exactly thrilling (even if I have to admit of being aware of it beforehand from online reviews). As I said, the level of violence seen here isn't too high (where there's gore, it's usually unconvincing and sometimes unlikely – for instance, a castration) and repetitive besides (the same weapon is used every time); the nudity (ranging from scenes depicting lesbianism, the near-rape of a model by an obese and impotent fellow and the concluding light-hearted[!] suggestion of sodomy to avert the possibility of an unwanted pregnancy) is mainly gratuitous, but certainly not lamentable whenever it involves either Fenech or Benussi (the uneasy reaction of a Police Inspector's assistant at her unabashed appearance during an interrogation scene is priceless).

The title of this movie sounds promising enough. And so does its concept. But the movie just doesn't deliver. It's not an horrible movie but it remains a disappointing one nevertheless.

Guess it's a Giallo but it just doesn't feel like a traditional one to me. It takes some wrong approaches and at times this can be a clumsy looking movie. Let's just say that Andrea Bianchi ain't no Dario Argento.

And for a movie with the word nude in its title...the movie does has an awful lot of nudity in it! I have seen porn with less nudity and sex than than movie has. Can't really say it always serves its purpose, story-wise, though the movie does luckily feature plenty of beautiful young Italian women in it, so what am I exactly complaining about.

But the movie does only really 'shock' with its nudity. Blood, gore and violence is present in this movie but it just never felt as if it was being the movie its main ingredient. It will disappoint the fans of the genre and quite frankly there aren't really ever enough killings in this movie, or perhaps the problem is that there is too much time between them and it all seems to happen very random, without any apparent logic behind them. It also makes the mystery behind whodunit far less interesting.

It also makes the movie as a whole just not very interesting to watch. This is also because it features lots of pointless sequences, that let the movie start to drag. It all still could had been good and interesting if some more horror/slasher stuff was going on.

It's also weird that the movie its main character isn't always present throughout the movie. It also doesn't help him that he isn't being a very likely person. Just a typical Italian playboy, that looks too old to be still hanging around and fooling around with young beautiful women.

Really not the most intriguing or effective Giallo out there. The first shot is still legendary though!

5/10

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