The Killer Must Kill Again — The Killer Must Kill Again(Blu Ray)
With a title like The Killer Must Kill Again, and a release date of the mid-70s, you’d imagine a gory proto slasher. But in reality, this Italian production is seen by some as a gialli, but I’d say it’s more of a straight-if-at points-suspenseful thriller. It features, in its lead, Mr Giallo himself as George Hilton, as a husband who decides to get rid of his wife, but things don’t go quite as planned. The film has a fast-moving, fairly simple but effective plot- with some great moments of tension, and light touches of sleaze & gory murder. Here from Rustblade- is a Blu-ray release of the film, taking in an interview with the director and a few other things.
The Killer Must Kill Again (L'assassino è costretto ad uccidere ancora) is from the year 1975. It was the first feature film from Busto Arsizio, Italy born Luigi Cozzi. He has nineteen features to his name taking in the likes of sex comedy The Naked Doorwoman (1976), Star Wars rip-off Starcrash (1978), rock music-tinged slasher/ giallo Paganini Horror (1988). Cozzi has also for many years run Dario Argento’s shop in Rome, Profondo Rosso
The film opens up, introducing us to Mr(Hilton) and Mrs (Tere Velázquez) Mainardi- in their very glossy yellow & blue apartment. He’s spending all of her money, and she's getting fed up with him
He goes out for a drive and comes across a man(Antoine Saint-John) dumping the body of a woman in the nighttime river. He asks this killer to take out his wife- it’s all agreed that our killer will go to their apartment, kill her, and put her in the boot of the killer's car. But unfortunately, a male and female joy riders steal the killer's car.
From here, the killer takes chase of the car, and Mr Mainadi is questioned by tubby moustached Inspector(Eduardo Fajardo)- who feels there is something very off about the so-called kidnapping.
Acting-wise Hilton is just fine as our lead, as is the rest of the cast. But the highlight here is Saint-John as our killer, as he both looks/ acts creepy with his pale, sunk cheeked face, and cold eyes.
As mentioned earlier, the film has a fairly simple plot- but it’s all executed well, with a keen sense of both suspense and unease kept alive throughout. In the latter part of the film, we get moments of sleaziness and brutality-with one or two decent plot twists too.
This new release features both the original Italian language and English dub. The print looks good, with even clarity/ good colour balance, though on the English dub, you do have to push the volume way up to hear the film properly.
On the extras side, we have a few new things- these are all in Italian, and you have to manually switch on the English subs. We have an interview with director Luigi Cozzi(31.37) he starts off talking about how he moved to Rome, interviewed/befriended Dario Argento, and co-wrote Four Flies on Grey Velvet(1971). Before discussing how the film to hand came about- moving from adjusting the original story the film was based on to be more suspenseful, on to making the film.
Otherwise, critic Federico Frusciante discusses the film(14.07), and a location tour from Giallo Italiano(6.54). And an original trailer.
The Killer Must Kill Again is most certainly a decent and suspenseful 70s Euro thriller/ gialli. So it’s great to see this release from Rustblade, with a so-so selection of extras and good print.