Sam Panico We went to see Blood and Black Lace in the theater a few weeks ago and there was a speaker before it. Maybe he's bad at speaking in public, but the guy gave short shift to the film, mumbling out about how it influenced Friday the 13th (I'd say Bay of Blood did more than this movie) and how it had a different title. And that was it. I was incensed. I wanted to get up out of my seat and scream that Mario Bava is the reason why lighting is the way it is and his use of color and how I can site hundreds of films that he influenced. But I sat in my seat and boiled while the movie unspooled, because I'm really passionate about Mario Bava and don't need to make a scene and miss seeing one of his films on the big screen.That said — Shock is Bava's last film. It's called Beyond the Door II here in the U.S., but I like the original title better. It's an ecomonical film — there are only three characters (well, three living characters). Dora (Daria Nicolodi, who should be canonized for giving birth to both Suspiria and Asia Argento, as well as roles in Deep Red, Inferno, Opera and so much more) and Bruno (Yor, Hunter from the Future's Overlord) are a newly married couple who have just moved back into her old home — the home where her drug addicted husband killed himself — with her son, Marco.Dora's had some real issues dealing with her husband's death. And Bruno is never home, as he's a pilot for a major airline. Either she's going crazy again or her son is evil or he's possessed or ever single one of those things at once. You have not seen a kid this creepy perhaps ever — he watched his mother and stepfather make love, declaring them pigs. He tells his mom he wants to kill her. He makes his stepfather's plane nearly crash just by putting an image of the man's face on a swing.While Mario was sick throughout the filming (and his son Lambarto would fill in), you can definitely see his style shine through the simple story. There's one scene of Dora's face and her dead hsubands's and then her face that repeats vertically that will blow your mind up.Read more at https://bandsaboutmovies.com/2017/10/17/shock-1977/

tenebrae I had read many reviews of this Mario Bava "classic" and have seen it re-released many times due to the cult status it holds. Starting to watch this however I really couldn't understand why.I am no stranger to a good Italian movie and some of those can be very slow and lacking substance, so I was expecting big things knowing this was a cult classic, however I almost fell asleep in the beginning of this.It was just so slow to go anywhere, it felt like almost nothing was happening. It almost has an "Omen"-esque feel to it, where something seems to be up with the boy, but we are not totally sure what it is.Stick with it though, as the pace increases around the halfway point and doesn't really stop until the bloody conclusion. It's never going to be as good as "Blood and Black Lace", but it's certainly worth a watch.

GL84 After moving into an old house with her family, a mentally unhinged woman begins to increasingly suspect her former husband still haunts the property and tries to save her son from his presence.Overall this was an incredibly enjoyable and exciting effort with a lot to like. One of the best qualities here is the incredibly strong central premise of being stuck in the old house and why it was designated to return there, having such a strong connection with the location that's spelled out here in the convoluted back-story that grows increasingly more disturbed with each layer effectively making the stay there quite unwelcome in the first place and readily setting this one up right from the start. The way this one really digs into the psychosis of it all, that back-story giving a plausible excuse for all manner of really inventive scares from a hallucinatory attack by a floating razor-blade that follows her every move, a series of visions about a strange brick-wall that appears out of nowhere and the growing fascination her son has with either molesting her or her personal undergarments that altogether combine into a classy yet effectively sleazy affair in the greatest Italian traditions. The use of the child being possessed and whether that in itself is simply another form of her overall madness really makes for quite an intriguing premise throughout this that really makes the most of the time given to it with a rather intense and quite shocking series of events that may or may not be all in her head that continues on here and really helps to make the first half all that much more chilling as it lets the story unfold. When the second half really lets loose, this one tends to favor the action as the centerpiece is a massive ghostly attack throughout the entire house as it continually hurls furniture and belongings at her from an unseen force while demonic howls and screaming continually make their way throughout the scene which is long, intense and quite chilling overall which sets up the best part of this one. While this one did have a few small flaws, the only really damaging part is the factor of the first half here being a bit more relaxed in pace as the majority of the events play with her psychosis to the point that those are the only points of interest and that leads to a somewhat plodding, lumbering march to get going. It's all quite fun, but it doesn't match the relentlessness of the later half of the film and is really all that holds it back.Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence, Language, Nudity and intense child behavior.

lastliberal It has been said the Mario Bava is a better director than Dario Argento, but he does have the great scripts that Argento has. This final film of Bava shows his directorial talent and the script is really good also.It is a perfect Halloween film full of suspenseful music and creepy sounds, a great set, and just three main characters.Here, Bava has Argento's former partner, Daria Nicolodi, in the main role. She has appeared in many of Argento's films: Mother of Tears, Opera, Phenomena, Inferno, Suspiria and Deep Red. She even wrote Suspiria for Argento.Nicolodi is magnificent as a woman going mad.