Autopsy

This week I felt like getting back on the Giallo train so I watched:

Autopsy (1975).

Also known as The Victim or Corpse (terrible titles), this Giallo/Horror is known in Italy as Macchie Solari which translates to Sunspots. Autopsy is directed by Armando Crispino and is scored by Ennio Morricone.

The movie opens with sinister footage of solar flare activity before showing us a bunch of very graphic suicides. We then meet Simona Sanna (Mimsey Farmer), a young pathologist working on her masters degree with a thesis on suicides and faked suicides. The morgue she works in is slammed and she is so exhausted that she starts hallucinating that the corpses are coming to life and having intercourse with each other. We also meet her frustrated boyfriend, a rich photographer and race car driver Riccardo (Ray Lovelock). His main source of frustration seems to be Simonas insistence that they don't fool around until after her thesis is complete.

After a grueling days work, Simona returns home and meets an American, Betty Lenox who is staying in the same building, a building owned by Simona's father. Betty is found dead soon after, apparently yet another suicide, but her brother Father Paul Lenox (Barry Primus), insists that she was murdered.

Simona is pulled into the investigation of Betty's death and soon finds herself in over her head. Everyone seems to be hiding something and trust is hard to come by. People die but are they suicides or murders? Can she even trust herself?

By now you have probably noticed that suicide is heavily featured in this movie. There is also an almost absurd amount of nudity and simulated sex. Simona studies what I have to assume are real photographs of medical deformities and crime scene photos, some that are pretty nasty at that. There is also a scene featuring animal cruelty so if you are sensitive, consider this your warning!

Autopsy is labeled as a Horror/Giallo on Wikipedia and that is true. The beginning has strong horror vibes but after a while it seamlessly translates into a pretty typical Giallo. I haven't seen any of Crispino's other movies but Autopsy is nicely shot. The overall vibe is good, you can really feel the heat and stress building and the actors are solid. Mimsey Farmer has appeared twice here before, in Four Flies on Grey Velvet and in The Perfume of the Lady in Black. Lovelock was in Let Sleeping Corpses Lie and in Live Like a Cop, Die Like a Man. The rest of the cast are all old hands in Italian cinema and I recognized several faces all throughout.

Autopsy is a solid Giallo even though it feels a bit meandering. The list of possible suspects is a bit too short for such a long winded script and the ending was a bit of a letdown. Instead of the mystery being solved, we are just told who the villain is. Not a deal breaker, but definitely unsatisfying.

So, do I recommend this movie? Yes, to Giallo and Horror fans I do. I doubt many others would get any real enjoyment from Autopsy. I had a good time, even though this is far from a masterpiece. Even if the ending had been better I'd still rate this as a middle of the road affair which in itself is fine. Solid is still solid.

That's that and all that. Join me again next time and until then, have a great week!