Macchie Solari (a.k.a. Autopsy, 1974) Note: the opening sequences of this giallo steer it almost beyond a hard R rating (the nudity, violence and sexual goings on are quite unnerving and effective.)
This giallo sports a fascinating premise that is ultimately undone by the miscast of Barry Primus, and its descent from a truly original idea into a rather typical murder mystery scenario. I haven't seen this in at least 8 years.
So Mimsy Farmer's pathology intern Simona is investigating a rash of suicides in Rome for her thesis comparing real vs. fake suicides. This wave of self inflicted death is caused by a nasty summer heat wave and sun spots. Eventually some of these suicides will wind up being murders.
Macchie Solari starts out with a serious exploitative bang, as several people -including naked women- start killing themselves. Simona has been working overtime in the awful heat and starts hallucinating that the naked cadavers around her rise up and start having sex. These unnerving sequences are very effective and throws the viewer for a serious loop. Even Simona’s boyfriend Edgar (Ray Lovelock) is not what he seems (he pretends to be dead to tease his supremely serious lady before offering her a ride home.)
When an acquaintance of Simona seems to take her own life, a mentally unstable priest Father Lenox (Barry Primus), appears at the hospital morgue and proclaims this woman's death was not a suicide. Turns out this suicide was his sister Betty which pulls the padre into the mix. Adding to this intriguing idea: people close to Simona start dying too. Is it Simona's father? The priest? Edgar? Could it even be Simona (who has been showing signs of duress from overworking in the heat?)
So far, so very good (except for Primus.) As you begin to wrap your brain around the idea that Simona will have absolute proof of a fake suicide for her thesis by investigating Betty Lenox's demise, the plot collapses as people close to our intern turn up dead. In past viewings I've been so annoyed by Primus, the plot lost its hold on my cinematic curiosity. This still stands, but I was able to ignore him enough this time to pay more attention until the story tripped up.
Time has made me less boo-hiss against Mimsy Farmer's corpse-like Simona (rather funny actually, given that she's a pathology intern), but I soured even more on Primus craptastic over-acting and the plot drifting away from that hook. One thing that remained interesting was how the sun spots and the brutal heat were playing havoc with Simona, the killer and most others around them. Father Lenox was already unstable and violent, but Primus utterly destroys any interest in his character. I keep waiting for him to die and wait....and wait....
Bad actor and story shift casts this hard R trashy whodunnit into pedestrian waters. Which is a shame since Ray Lovelock was adorably off-putting as Simona's lover Edgar, Ennio Morricone delivered perhaps his most unsettling score, and the disturbing opening sequence of Roman citizens killing themselves in various ways before transitioning into a deranged and creepy sexual vista in the morgue. Nothing frustrates me more as a movie-goer than when a really great premise isn't followed through. I can roll with bad acting if it's the in spirit of the character and the movie. In Mimsy's case, it works here. In Primus' case, any time he is on screen it nearly stops the movie, um, dead.
As I was revisiting this, I decided whenever I get into film school if I'm given an assignment of a movie to remake, it would be this one. This could have been one of the best giallos not made by Argento or Martino. Oh well.
