The Iguana with a Tongue of fire

L'IGUANA DALLA LINGUA DI FUOCO

THE IGUANA WITH A TONGUE OF FIRE

D: Willy Pareto (Riccardo Freda)

P: Alfonso Donati for Oceani, Les Films Corona, & Terra Filmkunst//Sc: Riccardo Freda,Gunther Ebert, Alessandro Continenza, André Tranche//DP: Silvano Ippoliti//E: Riccardo Freda//M: Stelvio Cipriani//Art D: Chevalier Mifsuo//Costumes: Nadia Vitali//Makeup: Lamberto Marini

Cast: Luigi Pistilli, Dagmar Lassander, Anton Diffring, Valentina Cortese, Dominique Boschero, Werner Pochath, Renato Romano, Arthur O'Sullivan, Sergio Doria, Ruth Durley.

The disfigured body of a young woman is found in the trunk of Ambassador Sobiesky's automobile. Due to the delicate nature of the Ambassador's standing (and his refusal to cooperate), the police assign Inspector Norton to go undercover and strike up an affair with Sobiesky's daughter, Helen. Norton (who has a history of police brutality) discovers the Sobiesky clan has a few skeletons in their familial closet. There is a son who is ostracized from the family, a wife who so hates her husband, she threatens him at every opportunity, numerous mistresses, and disgruntled servants. All of these people appear to have a motive for wanting Sobiesky dead. More murders occur (using a vial of acid and straight razor as weapons), before it's revealed that there were actually two murderers: one who so hated the Ambassador that he wanted to kill everyone associated with him and two, another who used the activities of the real killer, to knock off people he no longer had any use for.

I know Riccardo Freda is respected as the first modern day Italian horror filmmaker, but quite frankly, I find a lot of that ground-breaking work so restricted by the moral climate of the time, to be boring. Freda's films from the seventies are much more suited to my sensibilities. IGUANA is an entertaining thriller and it has a decidedly nasty edge to it at every plot turn. The killings are quite graphic and mean-spirited and the nudity on display reveals plenty (especially featuring Pistilli's nymphet-like daughter). It's a real pleasure to see Luigi Pistilli get an opportunity to play the lead role for a change.It's a shame he became despondent in his later years and committed suicide. He gets to ride a motorcycle and even has a nice nude lovemaking sequence with Dagmar Lassander. The film also pokes fun at genre conventions when, after viewing the film, you realize Freda told us who the killer was, 30 minutes into the film! Cipriani's use of strings in the musical score appears to make everyone a suspect at one time or another. Finally, I had to laugh when it was revealed that Anton Diffring's decidedly Germanic Ambassador has his clothes cleaned at "Swastika Cleaners!"