Touch of Death

For an 80 minute TV flick from Italy you could do a lot worse I'm sure. It's got a made for TV look. I'm guessing it was videotaped rather than filmed since it was made for TV. That is the main downfall in what is otherwise a pretty decent horror flick.

We have some top notch splatter here. Very disgusting and vile. Nothing pleasant whatsoever. But it never really takes itself seriously since it's a black comedy. Portions of the score are good and then portions are atrocious making this TV cheapie seem even cheaper.

Fulci does what he can with the budget and provides some interesting camera work and makes us laugh at some nasty stuff (interesting since Fulci didn't do too many straight up black comedies). As with many Fulci films, the ending leaves one with a feeling of 'WTF?' Which is exactly what we should expect from this king of horror.

Not a great film by any means but if you're a Fulci fan, pick it up.

Lucio Fulci is one of the leading names in gore-soaked horror cinema, and Touch of Death certainly does that reputation proud! Fulci's films started to get worse as his career progressed (with the exception of the hilarious Cat in the Brain in 1990), and as this film was released in 1988; you can count on it not being as good as his previous output. In fact, with films like Don't Torture a Duckling and The Beyond in mind; Touch of Death is one of Fulci's weaker efforts, but even so - there's plenty here to delight the man's fans. The film is clearly meant to be something of comedy, but the comedy is more of the absurd, over the top variety than one that will have you in stitches. Fulci's use of music helps to instill the absurdity of the film, which sees lonely widower/gigolo Lester Parson taking women home and putting them to use. He likes to mutilate them in horrible ways, such as beating them with a stick and chopping them up with a chainsaw; and just to add to the proceedings, he eats them too. Fulci also installs a subplot about the investigation into the murders, and the murderer's descent into madness.

This film is something a prelude to Cat in the Brain, and it's obvious that Fulci had Touch of Death in mind when he made his self-starring vehicle, as many of the gore scenes from that film are taken from this one. The scenes of gore are really quite nasty, but their impact is lessened by the comic tone. The first scene of gore sees our 'hero' going to work with a chainsaw (surely horror cinema's finest weapon), and then putting the remains of his victim into a meat grinder. Then we are treated to a beating scene (which features some of Fulci's trademark eye violence), a nasty sequence involving a car, a corpse having it's feet cut off and several other scenes along the same line. The film is really dirty; with the poor cinematography adding brilliantly to the overall unclean feel of the movie. The acting is typically low level, but the actors portray their (mostly silly) characters with gusto, and the result is a film that people will like more it's fun value than its credibility. Being a Fulci fan, I am more susceptible to this sort of trash; and I cant really say that non-Fulci fans will get much of a kick out of it.

I was actually very pleasantly surprised. I didn't go into this expecting much as i've never been a huge Fulci fan, but I do enjoy him, and as far as Fulci this probably had tighter editing and a more straightforward storyline than anything else I've seen by him. The 'twist' was obvious the entire time but it didn't make the film any less enjoyable and there were no plot holes- maybe a first for him? This film was less surreal than most and mainly focused on dark comedy and a simple crime tale, not much in the way of sets or cinematography, but it did what it set out to do, and with less stumbling than I've come to expect from the 'godfather of gore'. All in all a worthy watch if you can get your hands on the BluRay edition.

Lucio Fulci is the kind of director who, years down the road, will achieve the stardom he deserves. As of now, he is pretty much infamous. His later works, especially post 1990, are really pretty bad. In truth, they are no worse than many early 90's American horror films, but the dubbing is so bad that it's hard to take Fulci's later work seriously at all, really. When possible, any 1990's Italian horror movie should be viewed in Italian with English subtitles. They are MUCH better that way.

"Touch of Death" is so funny in parts that I almost peed myself the first time I saw it. The woman's head in the oven, the car mauling, the baseball bat scene...the list goes on from there, trust me. It's got pretty decent gore, too. I'm sure Fulci focused a lot more effort on that than he did on the plot, which is not meant to be taken too seriously. "Touch of Death" is just a fun movie. It's not going to scare you, it might gross you out in some parts though! Watch it with all this in mind, and you'll enjoy it for what it is.

7 out of 10, kids.

"Touch of Death" is the story of Lester Pearson, a down on his luck gambler whom starts seducing wealthy women with various deformities, then killing them off for a prie fixe lunch of human flesh and cash for his horse racing betting debts.

Fulci has an oft tenuous grasp on his plots, but this has to be the most ridiculously over the top entry in the canon. Though the gore is the usual splatter spectacle (the best of which effects wise is probably the scene where the blackmailing vagrant is run over with Lester's car), it's housed in too goofy of a context to be scary.

After several of the least politically correct murder scenes in film (a bearded lady meets death in a microwave, an inexplicably opera singing widow who solos in her sleep is interrupted by being strangled)and some darkly comic body disposal (complete with silly cartoonish theme music), Lester realizes he has a larger problem than lady killing. An imitator is leaving incriminating evidence at the scene of his crimes that points to Lester. Before long, his picture, modus operandi and DNA genetic code (?!) are being broadcast on the nightly news. Will his latest target ("Cannibal Ferox"'s Zora Kerova) find out before it's too late?

The final twist makes no logical sense and shoestring budget shows, but "Touch Of Death" is a mindless guilty pleasure of Fulci poking fun at himself that will entertain his devoted fans.