| Nude per l'assassino | |
|---|---|
 Italian poster | |
| Directed by | Andrea Bianchi |
| Screenplay by | Massimo Felisatti |
| Story by | Andrea Bianchi |
| Starring | |
| Cinematography | Franco Delli Colli |
| Edited by |
|
| Music by | Berto Pisano |
Production company | Fral Cinematografica[1] |
Release date |
|
Running time | 98 minutes |
| Country | Italy |
| Language | Italian |
Nude per l'assassino (English:Strip Nude for Your Killer) is a 1975giallo film directed byAndrea Bianchi. Written byMassimo Felisatti, the film starsNino Castelnuovo,Edwige Fenech andSolvi Stubing, and features music byBerto Pisano.Nude per l'assassino has received mixed reviews from critics.
After a model dies while undergoing an illegal abortion, a killer disguised in a motorcycle helmet tracks down and kills the doctor involved. Several models and photographers working at the same agency as the dead girl are also murdered, leading two surviving photographers to fear for their lives as they try to track down the killer.
Nude per l'assassino is one of several collaborations between Bianchi, Felisatti and cinematographerFranco Delli Colli. The film has been described as a formulaicgiallo thriller, and has been cited as an influence on the development of the Americanslasher film genre.
After a fashion model dies while undergoing an illegal abortion, the attending doctor moves her body back to her home, staging her death to remove any trace of his involvement. However, that same night he is murdered by a stranger disguised inracing leathers and a motorcycle helmet. At the Albatross Modelling Agency, the womanizing photographerCarlo embarks on an affair with fellow photographerMagda.
Meanwhile, a newly hired model,Patrizia, fends off the unwanted advances ofMaurizio, whose wife owns the agency. One evening, Mario, who also works at the agency, invites a guest in racing leathers into his home for a drink, and is stabbed to death. The police question the agency's ownerGisella and another model,Lucia about the killing, but learn very little. Gisella makes Lucia exchange in sex with her to keep her job; one night when Gisella leaves after a fight, Lucia is attacked and killed.
Maurizio propositions another model, Doris, but when she refuses to sleep with him for money, he attempts to rape her. However, he suffers from impotence andDoris leaves unharmed. Shortly afterwards, Maurizio is stabbed by the killer. Carlo later witnesses Gisella being murdered, and is able to photograph the attack; however, he runs off and is injured in a hit and run accident. While he is in hospital, Magda recovers his camera and attempts to develop the film, but the killer breaks in and destroys the negatives. Carlo hurries home, but the killer has gone—going instead to kill Doris and her abusive boyfriend Stefano.
Carlo finds Magda alive, but the killer returns to attack them both. During the struggle, the killer is knocked down a flight of stairs. The killer is unmasked and revealed to be Patrizia, who accuses Carlo of causing the death of her sister—the girl who died in the botched abortion, and whose death it is revealed Carlo helped to conceal. However, Patrizia dies of her injuries, leaving no trace of Carlo's involvement.
WriterMassimo Felisatti did not wish to be seen as having solely written the film, and gave directorAndrea Bianchi credit for the story in order to "deflect his role and not have to bear full responsibility" for the script.[2] Bianchi, Felisatti and cinematographerFranco Delli Colli would collaborate again the following year inLa moglie di mio padre.[3]Nude per l'assassino's score was written byBerto Pisano, who would also go on to write the score for Bianchi's 1979 filmMalabimba – The Malicious Whore.[4] Bianchi would later cast Femi Benussi, who portrayed one of the slain models, in two other films—La moglie di mio padre andCara dolce nipote [it].[5]
Nude per l'assassino has been described as following "thegiallo formula almost to the letter", demonstrating that "thegiallo conventions established byBava andArgento and elaborated upon by a number of directors in the early 1970s had become well codified" by the time the film was produced.[6] The film has also been cited as being "the perfect bridge to the Americanslasher film", with its emphasis on "violence and sex" and a plot "dumbed down to the barest minimum".[7]
Nude per l'assassino was released on 26 August 1975.[8] Upon release in the United Kingdom on October 4, 1979, it was ratedX by theBritish Board of Film Classification, following the removal of five minutes of material from the film.[9] It has subsequently received home media releases in English byBlue Underground asStrip Nude for Your Killer, first on DVD on October 25, 2005,[10] and onBlu-ray Disc on March 27, 2012.[11] Shameless Screen Entertainment also released a DVD version under the titleStrip Nude for Your Killer on October 27, 2008.[12] The film has also been distributed under the titlesTenebre braccia della morte andStrip Naked for Your Killer.[13]
Nude per l'assassino has been met with mixed reviews. Martyn Auty of theMonthly Film Bulletin, stated that "For all its clichéd direction (voyeuristic threateningly subjective camerawork) and perfunctory sexual diversions, this routine sex-ploiter is at least tolerably shot and unfussily plotted."[14] Writing forAllMovie, Jason Buchanan rated the film two stars out of five, calling it "unabashedly sadistic".[8] Budd Wilkins, writing forSlant magazine, rated the film three stars out of five, calling it "one of the more sordid examples" of thegiallo genre. Wilkins noted that the film's violence "isn't necessarily stronger than in contemporarygiallo films like Argento'sDeep Red", but that it is "more resolutely tied to aberrant sexuality than almost anywhere else in the genre". Wilkins also compared the film's central premise—that of revenge for a failed abortion—to that ofMassimo Dallamano's 1972 filmWhat Have You Done to Solange?.[15]DVD Talk's Adam Tyner also gave the film two stars out of five, summarising it as "not much of a movie". Tyner noted thatNude per l'assassino "doesn't set out to be revered as an artistic triumph", and described it as "worth at least a rental" for fans of the genre.[16]
Writing forThe A.V. Club, Noel Murray compared the film toSergio Martino's 1972 filmYour Vice Is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key (Il tuo vizio è una stanza chiusa e solo io ne ho la chiave), noting that "both take place among the idle European aristocracy, with vapid models, rugged motocross drivers, bigoted executives, and debauched artists wandering through a world of soft fabrics and bloody, gashed skin".[17]Bloody Disgusting's Mike Pereira ratedNude per l'assassino 0.5 out of 5, writing that it "reeks of amateur hour". Pereira felt that the film featured "dead-on-arrival pacing" and "terrible filmmaking and acting[18] A staff review for the Italian magazineNocturno rated the film four out of five, describing it as "one of the most daring"giallo films of the 1970s.[nb 1][19] Previewing the film's Blu-ray release,IGN's David McCutcheon describedNude per l'assassino as an "infamous shocker that packs more grisly violence and sexual depravity into each frame than just about any other film".[20]