5 Women For the Killer

Cinque Donne Per L'Assasino Italy-France 1975 D: Stelvio Massi P: Carlo Maietto, Vincinzo De Leo, Silvio Siano for Thousand Cinematografica (Rome) & Les Films La Boetie (Paris)//St & Sc: Roberto Gianviti, Gianfranco Clerici, & Vincenzo Mannino//DP: Sergio Rubino//E: Mauro Bonanni//M: Giorgio Gaslini//Costumes: Sergio Palmieri Cast: Francis Matthews, Pascal Rivault, Giorgio Albertazzi, Howard Ross (Renato Rossini), Katia Christine, Catherine Diamant, Gabriella Lepori, Maria Cumani Quasimodo, Tom Felleghi, Carla Mancini.

Giorgio Pisani arrives home to find his pregnant wife dead and his premature child in intensive care. A woman doctor friend shows him a report proving him sterile, thus he realizes that his wife must have fooled around on him to get pregnant (she was desperate to have a child). Soon, associates and friends of Giorgio start turning up with their throats and bellies slashed open with a straight razor.SPOILER ALERT!! All the clues lead to Giorgio (stiffly played by Francis Matthews), so of course, he's innocent. It was his doctor friend Lydia (Pascal Rivault), who was actually the sterile one and killing those who could have children.

Katia Christine as Giorgio's child's nanny is simply beautiful to look at, too bad she has the charm of cardboard. Massi,like Castellari, shows that horror films are not his cup-of-tea. He would prove that Cops-n-Robbers (with no horrific elements) is where his interest lie. The film also uses the two-killers motive, so endemic to these films as a philandering physician employs the modus operandi of the killer to get rid of a troublesome paramour. There are plentiful nude scenes and gore is abundant (however, the crudely used torsos, the killer's blade cuts up looks like H.G.Lewis was an on-the-set advisor), yet Massi's flaccid setups and execution really drags this mess down.