Clevercell Very disappointing...

Laikals The greatest movie ever made..!

Executscan Expected more

CommentsXp Best movie ever!

Nigel P A beautifully photographed Venice provides a stunning and misty backdrop for this solid giallo. By 1978, I would have thought this particular strand of cinema would have vanished – but it is good to see the appetite for Italian horror/thrillers remains, even if it isn't as prolific as it was in the early 1970s.It is interesting to note that by this time, the male hero (Stefano, played by Lino Capolicchio) is not as meticulously coiffured as earlier in the decade, an is also a good deal more gallant and less blatantly chauvinistic towards the still glamorous heroine (Sandra, played by Stefania Casini).Other than that, things have changed very little – it would hardly be a giallo if they had. We are still quickly headed knee-deep into a fairly convoluted storyline involving intrigue, graphic murder (the opening scene involves an unfortunate female throwing her mane of hair about as she is throttled in slo-mo) and a chorus line of suspects.One for fans of giallo rather than for someone dipping their toe into the genre for the first time: this 119 minute runaround is rather too long for my tastes.

kapelusznik18 ****SPOILERS**** Burned out young collage professor Stefano D'Archangelo tried to get himself-mind & body-together by taking off and going home to the offshore island of Murano to chill out only to get involved in a number of Gaillo-like murders that suddenly strike the place. We soon find out that a young Stefano had witnessed a murder of a young girl that, in not being able to identify the killer, has haunted him ever since. Striking up a conversation with interior decorator Sandra Casini on his way to the island and later falling in love with her Stefano doesn't realize that her grand-mother has a painting of the murder of the young lady that will-when he sees it-trigger a slew of memories to who murdered her! And that will lead the killer to resurface and try to do in both him Sandra and some dozen other inhabitants that he feels, in crimes that they committed, are more then worthy of being slaughtered!It's Stefano's older brother Father Paolo the town preacher or priest who first witnessed, on a dark and rainy evening, one of the murders committed by the killer but fails, by chickening out, to prevent it. It's after that Father Paolo suddenly takes a keen interest -due to his guilt feeling about the incident-in catching the killer.This as the killer goes on a murdering rampage all over town knocking off a number of people that even Father Paolo himself feels deserves all that was-as well as came-coming to them!****SPOILERS****Living in a fog all these years after seeing the young girl murdered Stefano's mind cleared up when he realized that a painting in Sandra's grandmother home depicted the murder that he had so long forgotten. Which then leads him to confront the killer about his actions and all hell broke loose in him realizing what a terrible person he is. Instead of doing himself in on the spot, that would have shorten the film by some ten minutes, the exposed killer kept us entertained by rushing up what look like a 100 foot tower with Stefano hot on his tail and then, just for the very thrill of it, jumping to his death before he can get himself, with heavy psychiatry drugs & therapy, cleaned up!

avanttothefuture A Professor visits his Priest Brother on an isolated Island near Venice to recover from stress brought on by flashbacks related to a Childhood trauma. On his first night his Brother witnesses a murder and later begins to receive notes from the murderer threatening (what appears to be) violence. The brothers begin investigating the crime and the expected red herrings, pov shots etceteras entail...What separates this film from the Giallo of Argento and co. is not it's lack of that genera's expected tricks (black gloved killer, inventive murders, pov shots) as these are all referenced in knowing ways (the Director even discuses his debt to Argento in an interview included on the Blue Underground DVD) but it's obsession with guilt, loneliness and existential pain. The film's washed out colours and waterlogged settings alienate us not just from the surroundings but even from the visual aspects of the film, the aspect of film itself, the idea of entertainment. Instead we focus on the character's interior life's: their traumas, their loneliness, their religious doubts.The film features great performances, beautiful editing techniques and an ironic echo of the Catholic Rite of Confession wherein it is not the killer's confession that provides the relief from suffering but the discovery of the killer, the release from childhood trauma.Watch with Fulci's Non si sevizia un paperino rather than Susperia and have a catholic encyclopedia open.

Bjorn (ODDBear) The Bloodstained Shadow, or, Solamente Nero is at best a fair giallo.It's got a lot of the giallo trademarks and some scenes that basically rip off other famous giallo's (most notably Deep Red and Don't Torture a Duckling) but it's terribly slow moving. What proves to be it's saving grace is a number of well executed set pieces, most of them involving horrific murders. Bido hasn't got the visual flair of Argento or Bava so what we basically have here is the story, which is longwinded, a bit obvious and with some annoying plot holes.The film builds suspense pretty well and the set pieces are great, but they're few and far between, leaving us with an uninteresting love story that's lacking any chemistry between the actors.By no means bad, simply average.