AUTOPSY

This is a very peculiar giallo. Starting out with a few brief scenes of people committing suicide and a freaky, queasy hallucination in a morgue room - complete with corpses rising up from their slabs and having sex with one another - it quickly moves back into standard giallo territory before becoming something closer to a drama for the majority of it's running time. It's this strange mixture of narrative and thematic elements that makes Armando Crispino's AUTOPSY so interesting to watch, even if the end result leaves you wanting more.


Mimsy Farmer Autopsy

Mimsy Farmer plays Simona, a medical under-graduate writing a thesis on the differences between faked suicides and genuine suicides. Her work is starting to get to her. She's exhausted both physically and emotionally, the latter causing some friction between her and her photographer boyfriend, played by Ray Lovelock. She is simply unable to perform sexually, a fact her boyfriend relentlessly teases her about, calling her things like "my little ice cube". She is also somewhat estranged from her father, a wealthy playboy type who lives in a posh apartment above her own. One night, Simona is visited by a beautiful redhead named Betty who is a bit on edge. She is his father's new lover and Simona offers whatever assistance she can. Betty is found dead on the beach the next morning, an apparent victim of suicide. When Betty's body turns up at the morgue, Simona has an uneasy feeling about how she died. Her brother Paul shows up at the to ID the body. A priest, Paul is convinced that Betty could not have committed suicide because he recently absolved her of her sins and he is dead-set on finding out exactly what happened to his sister.


Ray Lovelock Mimsy Farmer Autopsy

That's about it for the main set-up. The rest of the film contains many of the giallo staples - nudity, sex, a few stalkings, hard-ass cops - but the execution is markedly different. For starters, the attention paid to the film's main characters overshadows the central mystery, almost to the point of distraction. Simona is one of the more well-rounded female protagonists in the giallo film, a professional, rational woman focused so strongly on her work that she has become something of an automaton. Paul is an ex-race car driver who joined the Church after killing a few patrons in a racing accident. Both characters are supremely repressed - Simona is unable to consummate her relationship with her boyfriend and Paul is carrying a lot of guilt from the accident - and their relationship is both volatile and ripe with potential. They fall in love but Paul turns down her advances saying that he cannot go back on his vows. By the film's end, Simona has broken out of her shell and Paul has avenged his sister but it's doubtful either character lives happily ever after. Paul is unable to save the life of the killer and Simona has effectively lost every one she loves with the exception of a man she can never be with.


Armando Crispino's Autopsy

While several giallo killers have used faked suicides to cover up murders here and there - for example, in THE STRANGE VICE OF MRS. WARDH, the killer tries to murder Edwige Fenech by leaving her in a room with the gas oven on - it is the total modus operandi of the killer in AUTOPSY. This is perplexing at best, especially so once the killer's identity has been revealed, but it generally works within the world of the film. Speaking of murder, I must say that those people expecting something bloody will likely want to skip this film. There are very few murders in AUTOPSY and relatively little blood is spilled. The raincoat crowd might enjoy it a bit more. The pseudo-scientific angle of having sun spots bringing about a rash of suicides is also a bit out of place - the original Italian title of the film, MACCHIE SOLARI, translates to "Sun Spots" - as are some of the side characters, all of which seem like holdovers from other less interesting giallo films.


Autopsy giallo film

While this is in fact a giallo film, I almost don't want to call it one. It feels more like a slowly paced Italian crime drama than a giallo. In fact, if I had to judge it as a giallo, I would have to say it fails miserably. The underlying mystery is pretty uninteresting and the lack of genuine suspense makes the whole thing feel tired and dull. But the performances in the film are all good - especially Farmer and Barry Primus in the role of Paul. They have an undeniable chemistry together and their relationship is interesting and well-developed. All AUTOPSY needs is a stronger core mystery and a bit more suspense and it would be well worth a spot in the top gialli of it's day.


As it stands, it's a nice change of pace from all the black-gloved killer tales but little else.