User reviews

Death Smiled at Murder…and horror admirers all over the world salute Joe D'Amato for delivering this film, by which he proves that he's not just an insane and untalented adult-filmmaker. Okay, D'Amato made a lot of meaningless, cheap quickies throughout his entire fertile career but he does know how to tell a creepy and unsettling horror tale. Just look at 'Beyond the Darkness'…or this 'Death smiled at Murder', which is an even better example. The plot doesn't always make sense, but it's beautiful to look at and it's very stylishly elaborated. The settings and photography are mesmerizing and the delightful musical score is almost hypnotic. But of course, this wouldn't be a D'Amato film if it didn't also feature a rather large dose of sleaze and violence. Kinky Joe shamelessly stuffed his film like a Thanksgiving turkey with slightly perverted elements (incestuous lust, an obscene love-triangle…) and nauseating gore (decomposed corpses, a face entirely shattered by shotgun…)

Summarizing the plot of 'Death Smiled at Murder' isn't a very easy thing to do as it handles about multiple macabre topics. A sinister doctor is on the verge of translating an ancient formula carrying the secret of how to raise the dead. A beautiful young girl and her deranged brother seem to be involved in this process as well but they first annihilate the entire population of a countryside mansion. The owners of this mansion, a rich couple, are both romantically involved with the gorgeous girl named Greta. The acting is fairly good as well, with Klaus Kinski on top. His role in the film isn't very essential, but his up-to-no-good grimaces provide the story with an extra bit of eeriness. With this film, D'Amato proved being capable of delivering films that are on the same quality-level as some of the Jess Franco films and maybe some of the weakest Mario Bava films. Recommended to every fan of top-Eurosleaze

This movie seems interesting on paper: it's directed by the infamous Aristide Massacessi (aka Joe D'Amato) and it features overly intense German actor Klaus Kinski and Swedish nymphet Ewe "Candy" Aulin. But fans may find D'Amato being a little too classy, Kinski being a little too subdued, and Aulin being a little too dressed. This movie is a latter-day Italian Gothic but it was made at a time when those films, which had been big in the 60's, were in decline and the more delirious Italian gialli were ascendant. This film is a strange hybrid of the two--it has the period trappings of a Gothic horror but makes even less sense than your average giallo.

The plot (if that word applies here)involves two different doctors who seem to be reviving the dead for some reason--or are they? (I'm not being mysterious here--I really don't know). One of them is Klaus Kinski, but I suspect the famously temperamental actor might have stormed off the set so they gave part of his role to somebody else. Ewe Aulin is the dead(?) woman who seems no worse for wear. After her carriage crashes on the estate of a nobleman (who coincidentally is the doctor's son),he and his wife take her in and they both fall in love with her. The wife, however, is very jealous (although it's not clear of whom) and keeps trying to kill this possibly already dead girl. After an unsuccessful bathtub drowning (which naturally turns into a steamy lesbian sex scene) she seals her in a tomb with the family cat (for yet another Italian homage to Edgar Allen Poe) before the movie sinks completely into incomprehensibility.

This film resembles other latter-day Italian gothics like "The Devil's Wedding Night" (with Rosalba Neri) or "The Night Evelyn Came out of the Grave" (with Erika Blanc). I would have preferred Neri or Blanc to Aulin in this kind of movie--they all look good naked, of course, but Blanc and Neri are a lot better in these evil roles. The cinematography here is definitely superior to the other two films, however, and is the best thing about this movie (it's easy to forget that D'Amato was a superb cinematographer before he became a world-renowned pornographer). Fans of virtuoso cinematography, non-linear Eurohorror, and badly-dubbed Eurobabes, who aren't bothered too much by a complete lack of plot will probably like this. Others may not.

Joe D'Amato is often said to have directed nothing but worthless sleaze, but this reputation is certainly not (completely) justified. I have personally been a fan of the prolific Exploitation filmmaker for years, and though it is true that his repertoire includes a wide range of crap, he is also responsible for several downright great films, and for many vastly entertaining ones. Such as the ultra-gruesome video nasties "Antropophagus" (1980) and "Buio Omega" (1979). Or this stylish little film, in which D'Amato dabbles in the great sub-genre of Gothic Horror. "La Morte Ha Sorisso All Assasino" aka. "Death Smiled At Murder" of 1973 is a stylish, obscure and incredibly atmospheric Gothic tale that is incredibly creepy at times. Even though this is not as nauseating as "Antropophagus" or "Buio Omega", the film is genuinely nasty at times, with a wide range sexual intrigue and perversions as well as a bunch of very gory scenes. The film's arguably greatest aspect is the mesmerizing score by Berto Bisano, which contributes a lot to the film's uncanny atmosphere. The casting of the always-sinister Klaus Kinski in the (sadly small) role of a mad scientist is another highlight that makes this a must for my fellow Italian Horror lovers.

The one weak point of the film is that the story is a bit too confused for its own good. I love convoluted plots, but this one has several huge holes. A proper description would be difficult, as the film handles several topics that are interlaced, and the structure is not always 100 per cent comprehensible. Set in early 20th century Europe, the film is basically is about an ancient Incan formula, which is capable of awakening the dead. A beautiful young woman (Ewa Aulin) is injured in a coach accident near a castle that leaves the driver dead. The castle is owned by a kinky aristocratic couple, Walter Von Ravensbrück (Sergio Doria) and his wife Eva (Angela Bo). The mysterious beauty who cannot remember anything after her accident is first checked by the (equally mysterious) local Doctor Sturges (Klaus Kinski)... A macabre Gothic tale, the film also bears some elements of the Giallo and Zombie genres but it is mainly in the style of 60s Gothic Horror, transformed into a nastier and sleazier 70s style. The great Klaus Kinski (one of the greatest actors ever, in my opinion) gets top billing, but, sadly, little screen time. The man gets the best out of the screen time he has though, he simply was one of the most brilliant actors ever to play madmen. Although not as constantly sleazy as many other D'Amato outings, the film provides female eye-candy. The female cast includes beautiful Ewa Aulin in the lead and the equally sexy Angela Bo. The performances are generally quite good, other than the Kinski and the two leading ladies, the cast also includes two other cult-actors that any fan of Italian genre-cinema will recognize: the hunchbacked Luciano Rossi, who, due to his ugly looks, would mostly play crooks and psychos, who plays another demented role here, and Giacomo Rossi-Stuart, who is probably best known for his role in Mario Bava's Gothic masterpiece "Operazione Paura" (aka, "Kill Baby Kill") of 1966. Overall, "Death Smiled at Murder" has only one major flaw, which is that the storyline is too co fused. Otherwise, this is a creepy, atmospheric and vastly enjoyable Gothic tale from D'Amato that lovers of Italian Horror should not miss! My rating: 7.5/10

Death Smiles on a Murderer is not your average Joe D'Amato film. The prolific Italian director made a name for himself by directing cheap, trashy productions; and while this film isn't exactly "high quality" (in the usual sense of the word), it's certainly a lot classier than your average D'Amato sleaze. The film mixes Gothic horror, zombies and Giallo elements into a cocktail of the popular genres of the early seventies. As you might expect considering the heavy fusing of multiple genres, the film isn't always coherent; and despite the fact that it could be considered a classy film, D'Amato has still seen fit to insert some trashy gore sequences. The result is a mixed bag. The somewhat confusing plot focuses on a young woman called Greta. She is involved in a coach accident which leaves the driver dead after he is impaled. Greta is then taken in by a couple who seem to become strangely fascinated by her. Around the same time, there's also a doctor working on a formula to bring the dead back to life, and this somehow connects through flashbacks...

The setting and atmosphere are the key element of the film. Death Smiles on a Murderer is very well photographed and every frame in the film is great to look at. This serves the film well as it ensures that it remains interesting even when the plot starts to dry up. The plot itself takes influence from a range of sources, but most recognisably the great Edgar Allen Poe with several themes from the highly influential "The Black Cat". The head of the cast list is Klaus Kinski - but unfortunately, he doesn't appear in the film for long at all and he isn't given much to do with the screen time he does get, which is a shame. The leading ladies are Ewa Aulin and Angela Bo, and while neither of them stand out for their acting; they both look nice. The special effects don't really suit the film and Joe D'Amato probably would have been better advised to cut down on the bloodshed - but I can't complain too much because the gore does make the film more fun. Overall, I can't say I was overly impressed with Death Smiles on a Murderer - it looks nice and has its moments, but it's not put together well enough to be one of the great Italian horror films.

Death Smiles at Murder-Aristide Massaccesi (aka Joe D'Amato) This is not your typical D'Amato movie, if there is such a thing. There's graphic violence, a little gore, but nothing really over the top. But what this movie has, is a little style and maybe even ~~gasp~~ some class. It's very confusing, and includes everything from reanimation, to a three way love affair, to a murder mystery. The basic plot is about a young beautiful woman Greta, who shows up at a Villa and is involved in a horse carriage accident which impales the driver. A couple take her in since she has developed amnesia. There's a series of flashbacks that attempt to cast some Intel on who she is, but not why she is there. Klaus Kinski has a small role as the doctor who attends to her, but has a totally different agenda which deals with a concoction he's working on to bring back the dead. Soon the movie gets even more bizarre and even takes a little from Poe's "Black Cat". Everything looks pretty damn good in this movie, the sets, the actors, and the main thing I noticed is the main theme to the soundtrack is straight out of "Suspiria". In fact, you could pretty much say ~~stolen from Suspiria~~.

Both the Husband and his Wife fall in love with Greta, and the Wife especially turns out to be rather jealous and walls up Greta in the dungeon. After that some even more bizarre happenings occurs resulting in the gruesome death of the Wife. But what happened to the walled up Greta? Well, that little chore is up to the local Police Inspector, and he hasn't got a clue as to what is going on, because Greta has vanished. This all culminates in a fairly good, if not confusing, ending that seems to put most of pieces back in order.

In the 1960s, a series of low budget films known as Spaghetti Westerns emerged from Italy; Clint Eastwood starred in a number of these, most notably "The Good, The Bad And The Ugly". The 1970s saw horror films given the same treatment, and one or two of them were not bad. Sadly, this is neither number one nor number two.

Set in 1909, "Death Smiles On A Murderer" begins with a fatal crash and what appears to be a rape, then it slows right down to a virtual crawl. There is a lot of background music, which is not a bad thing for a supermarket or an elevator, but not here.

This film tries to be all things to all men – and women: Dr Frankenstein meets the zombies with a ghostly theme, detective novel, heck, there is even a hint of lesbian sex thrown in. Finally, it descends into silliness with a murder by what appears to be a supernatural cat, a scene that would have made Ed Wood cringe. It's an old story: jack of all trades, master of none.

You have to see this movie more than once to understand and figure out what's going on.In short,after being reanimated from the dead,Greta Von Holstein(Ewa Aulin)seeks revenge on a lover who jilted her by faking a carriage accident and causing the death of its driver on the estate of the son of the man who impregnated her.She is in cahoots with the butler of the estate,who helps with a lot of her dirty work(then meets his end after she uses him).A doctor(Klaus Kinski)finds out her secret after ministering to her after the buggy accident and copies an Incan formula off of her gold pendant for his own use and fame.The pendant was made for her by her brother(with whom she had an incestuous relationship with)who brought her back from the grave after a miscarriage and inscribed her name,the year of her rebirth,and a mathematical formula for reanimation on the pendant.Greta causes the death of almost everyone in the cast,but you won't really understand anything until about halfway through the movie.And she makes sure no one is left to tell her tale!Surrealistic sound track by Berto Pisano keeps the movie on it's feet in the tradition of Phantasm.Definitely a must see!

'Death Smiles on a Murderer' is a 1973 horror/giallo hybrid with a rich gothic setting bathed in an unnerving dreamlike atmosphere with stylish set-pieces, a non-linear storyline that's both confusing and intriguing at the same time. The camerawork has a lot of cool yet bizarre shots which adds more to the strangeness of this flick and the direction by Joe D'Amato is really strong with stunning cinematography work which makes every scene pop in the way it should.

The plot set in the early 1900's where a mysterious young woman Greta (Ewa Aulin) whose carriage crashes outside the Ravensbruck mansion and not remembering who she is, is soon taken in by the wealthy couple Mr & Mrs Von Ravensbruck. Soon the three of them enter into a dangerous love triangle, and soon it is revealed that Greta is there to take revenge on the family as the plot further unfolds.

I do admit that if you don't read the plot synopsis before watching this movie, then things get's really confusing due to it's oddly structured storyline that jumps around a lot with quickfire pacing that could allowed more time to breathe which makes the whole thing rather uneven as a whole. But there's enough thrills and surprises to keep you interested throughout with effective set pieces and a great cast of characters thrown together in this rather strange and unique world.

Ewa Aulin is fantastic as Greta who has a wonderful alluring quality to her mysterious character and Klaus Kinski is another firm standout as the mad scientist and gives a wonderfully creepy performance, and actually wanted more of him throughout, but the interesting subplot was cut rather short. Luciano Rossi as the brother Franz is quite effective and terrifying in his short screen time yet makes a firm impression.

Overall 'Death Smiles on a Murderer' is a pretty decent flick with an unusual structure that may not appeal to everyone, but it's an okay effort all round.

This is a peculiar film made around the time "Dark Shadows" was popular. Its a great story, but the only versions available in America are badly dubbed English ones with Japanese subtitles (?!!). Still this movie about Incan formulas bringing back the dead is fascinating. It is the fledgling effort of Joe D'Amato, and anyone who knows about this director knows that any film from him would be worth a peek. I'd like to see some smart apple remake it with a bigger budget, so the story could be done better justice. Until then this version will have to do.

Greta von Holstein (Ewa Aulin) survives a terrible accident, and is taken in by the Ravensbruck family. Dr. Sturges (Klaus Kinski) is called in to examine her. This somehow leads to his discovering how to re-animate the dead. When someone murders Sturges and absconds with his secret, horror soon follows.

That's the basic, skeletal plot. The rest of DEATH SMILES ON A MURDERER is a series of love affairs, sexual situations, and a soap opera story line with an Edgar Allan Poe tie-in, interrupted by gruesome deaths. This may sound cockeyed and absurd, and it is. However, there's something eerie about it that makes it watchable. It's held together by a sort of nightmare logic.

Beautifully filmed, with haunting set pieces, it seems nonsensical, yet satisfying nonetheless. Ms. Aulin is both stunningly beautiful and terrifying!

EXTRA POINTS FOR: The graveyard scene!...

D'Amato's directorial debut already incorporates his two major concerns – eroticism and gore; another element which, however, comes to the fore here (a pitfall of many a novice film-maker!) is an ostentatious approach to technique – with shots taken from any number of improbable angles! That said, the elliptical plot is nothing to scoff at either (indeed, whenever one thinks of having unraveled the mystery, another twist turns up to mystify the viewer, and this keeps up till the very last image!): to be fair, this was quite a bold move for a first feature and that is why, for all its faults, the film is not one to be easily ignored.

Incidentally, the central theme of resurrection was what linked it with the Christopher Lee vehicle THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM (1967; with which it was actually paired on DVD); while Klaus Kinski's presence (and co-star billing) in this was basically its selling-point, he exits the picture before it is even half over! He plays a Frankenstein-like doctor called in at a country estate to nurse a carriage accident/amnesiac victim played by Ewa Aulin (after years of research, he conveniently discovers the life-restoring formula on the back of a medallion she wears!) but, while he spends minutes on end carefully preparing the potion, is killed off precisely at his moment of triumph!!

As for the girl, she proves not quite the ingénue she at first appears (with a complicated back-story to boot!); seducing both the master and mistress of the house, she eventually drives the latter into a jealous fury which sees her walling up the still-living heroine in the basement! However, she re-appears as a vengeful wraith (with the girl's features occasionally reverting to her true decrepit state for horrific effect) with everybody who had in some way wronged her meeting all sorts of grisly demises (including her crazed and hunchbacked medical student brother – scratched to death by a cat in extreme close-up! – and the young aristocrat's doctor father Giacomo Rossi-Stuart, who had first impregnated the girl and then saw her die on the operating table!!).

Berto Pisano's score, which mixes moody interludes with a terrific romantic theme, emerges as one of the film's definite assets. By the way, this was Aulin (who had shot to stardom with CANDY [1968])'s penultimate effort; since its follow-up – Jorge Grau's well-regarded BLOOD CEREMONY (1973) – proved to be in similar vein, I will also be checking that one out presently...

I don't know why this has the fans it does and I don't know why I have even given it the score I have. This is preposterous. There are many a giallo where one has to suspend disbelief, let the picture roll and catch up with it somewhere before it becomes delirious and some poor police officer has to eventually explain what we have seen. But, this has very little going for it and has overlong sequences where nothing happens and have no relevance to anything while we have to listen to a most repetitive soundtrack, even by Italian standards. Not a giallo, this is a complete mish mash of horror ideas featuring Klaus Kinski in one his most blatant 'phoned in' performances. I reckon he turned up, did a day's work and cleared off leaving Mr D'Amato to get others to fill in. Ewa is of course pretty but no it is not enough, and in the end we have seen far too much of her popping up all over the place, long after we have completely lost interest in this mindless and pretentious twaddle. Maybe I just wasn't in the right mood!

Finally, yes, finally I encountered a Joe D'Amato film of which I can say I actually liked it. Even for the right reasons.

This isn't exactly a Giallo film, though the plot does incorporate a fair bit of murder mystery before eventually diving into the more supernatural spheres. It turned out a strange, rather unworldly mixture of things and at times D'Amato manages to create some good atmosphere. The story itself, even at the end, remains an illogical mystery, which only adds to the film's charm. If you give the film some thought, you'll find an explainable plot beneath it, but still some elements will remain that don't make a lot of sense. It's a convoluted cocktail of love, betrayal, murder and revenge. From beyond the grave. Klaus Kinski has a role as a professor on the verge of discovering the secrets to life after death. Sadly, Kinksi only lasts until halfway the picture (and his voice is unfortunately dubbed by another actor in the English version). Once again D'Amato doesn't exactly makes haste with his story, but for once he manages to compensate the lack of decent pace with maintaining a competent style & mood. And naturally, you may add a bit of gore & nudity to it also, but this time D'Amato didn't exaggerate. A surprisingly stylish supernatural Gothic/Giallo effort.

Lethargic, disjointed, meandering, unconvincing, and boring.

With five words I describe the overall plot, the scene writing, the acting, the sequencing, love scenes, violent scenes, special effects, music, and all else and everything in between. The halfway mark rolls around and whatever advancement there has been in the narrative up to that point has been not just minimal in the first place, but further feels flat, hollow, and flimsy in light of the film's craft from all angles.

There is a modicum of more meaningful story development in the second half, perhaps. But by that point we've endured entirely too much tedium to feel compensated for our patience by anything but the greatest of payoffs, and that just doesn't happen. And still the same flaws persist, testing our fortitude.

There are sketches of good ideas here, yet that's truly the nearest we get to worthwhile value - which is to say, for all intents and purposes, there is none. It's difficult to truly express just how dull and lifeless this movie is, and laborious to sit through. It's total dreck. The very title portends potential that does not exist, let alone manifest: 'Death smiles on a murderer' is extremely poorly made mediocrity that's not at all worth your time.

Watched this for the first time last night on Blu-ray, being a fan of both Italian horror and giallo movies and of Klaus Kinski I looked forward to it. The film looks pretty good, the early 20th Century costumes and sets were nice, there is a decent amount of gore plus plenty of nudity. I liked the musical score too though not sure that it matched the time period of the story. There is definitely some of Poe's story The Black Cat present, plus I felt Don't Look Now (1973). We get two creeps, not just Kinski (who's part sadly ends far too soon for my liking), but also Lucianno Rossi who plays a hunchback with a very unhealthy love interest in his own sister. I would go as far as to say he out-creeps Klaus in this movie. What let this movie down for me is the plot, I found it hard to fathom out what was actually going on. I will give it another chance, perhaps going for the Italian language option.

A man discovers an ancient Incan formula for raising the dead, and uses it for a series of revenge murders.

"Death Smiles on a Murderer" was produced by Franco Gaudenzi, who writer-director Joe D'Amato had met through production manager Oscar Santaniello. Their first collaboration led to D'Amato directing "Un bounty killer a Trinità", one of the several films directed by D'Amato with someone else taking credit. This was the first film D'Amato directed himself where he used his real name in the credits: Aristide Massaccesi.

The film credits the script to D'Amato, Romano Scandariato and Claudio Bernabei, though the latter was said to just be a typist by D'Amato. The story is credited to D'Amato, which Scandariato said was "more or less one page". Scandariato stated the film was originally written with more suspense and more of a giallo, but this was changed out of necessity. The film was given a low budget of 150 million Italian lire.

"Death Smiles on a Murderer" was shot between November and December 1972 with a working title of "Seven Strange Corpses". Some scenes which were not in the script were improvised on set. These included a scene where Luciano Rossi was attacked by a cat, which saw D'Amato achieve his desired effect by allegedly throwing the cat against Rossi's face. (I have real doubts about this given the footage that resulted.)

Actress Ewa Aulin was well-known at the time, though has strangely fallen into obscurity. Klaus Kinski is still widely known today, though perhaps more for his madness and depravity than his acting. He became involved purely for the money and had no real opinion of the material one way or the other.

While D'amato is best known for his exploitation work and occasional outright pornography, this film is rather tame. The gore is no worse than your standard horror film of the era, and while there is some nudity and romantic elements, it is fairly restrained, nothing remotely as blatant as we might see from Jean Rollin.

The Arrow Blu-ray is superb, with both English and Italian versions of the film. The incredible Tim Lucas provides audio commentary. Ewa Aulin has a brand-new interview, almost an hour in length. D'Amto is captured in an archive interview (primarily talking about Kinski). And a video essay covering D'Amato's career is worth a watch. An all-around spectacular package for the film.

Joe D'Amato gets a hard time for being a trashy director due to those porn films he made, but he often delved into other genres, and when he got them right, he often blew away the competition. This film, his official debut film (as he did a few Bava-style completion jobs for other directors) is a crazy mix of Gothic Horror and Giallo, and it's a beauty. Also, some people call it confusing, but it's not at all.

At first we see brother Luciano Rossi lamenting the death of his sister Greta, plus we also get a flashback that shows that the relationship was a bit...er...intimate. Next thing you know, Greta's alive and getting involved in a carriage crash outside one of those huge mansions you get in 99% of these films. She's taken in by a sister and brother and examined by doctor Klaus Kinski. Now, Kinski is freaky enough looking, but when he leans over Greta all his veins stick out on his head, and he looks like a Klingon! I digress - Klaus finds a weird necklace on Greta, takes a pin and sticks it through her eyeball, and then leaves, thoughtful. Greta strangely shows no affects of having a pin shoved through her eye and sets her sights on bedding both the brother and the sister.

Around this time it appears that Luciano Rossi is kicking about stalking a member of staff at the mansion who receives a very gory shotgun blast to the face. Yes, someone is out to kill everyone, but is it the creepy butler guy who is spying on everyone? Or the jealous sister, who tries to drown Greta in the bath, then beds her. It's not Klaus Kinski though, because he manages, using something on that weird necklace Greta had, to create a formula that can bring the dead back to life, which not only gets him killed by a mystery person, but also his assistant, and the poor corpse he brought back to life!

I'll stop there with the plot, because what first appears to be a kind of period Giallo ends up being far more sinister. It's like Joe D'Amato thought the genre wasn't strange or gory enough, and packs the film with people with their guts or brains hanging out, others nailed to walls, having their faces slashed to ribbons, or having their eyeballs pulled out by a cat. Being Joe, he doesn't skimp on the sex either, as Greta gets it on with just about everybody. You also get two creepy actors for the price of one, with Kinski and Rossi getting their own space to roll their eyes and be weird. Giacomo Rossi-Stuart looks depressingly aged in this film for some reason.

So once again Joe comes out on top like he did later in the post-apocalyptic genre with Endgame and 2020:Texas Gladiators, and the classic video nasty Anthropophagus. Maybe not so much with Ator The Fighting Eagle, which is a PG rated Conan rip-off that is great for all the wrong reasons.

I love these kinds of movies. I was lucky to grow up with them as a kid. I remember seeing Death Smiles On A Murderer on some late night channel and now it is on Tubi so I got to re-watch it again.

Now I like Klaus Kinsky as an actor, yes I know he was a abhorrent human being, probably due to a serious mental illness, but his acting is always sublime.

Joe D'Amato is on the top of his game here and rest of the cast are great. The music and photography are perfect and helps set an eerie atmosphere.

The film is gorgeous, it is really beautiful to look at despite all the gore. While the story is a bit convoluted, it does tie up in the end. I had to watch it a couple of times before I got the whole thing, but that's me.

It is a great addition to anyone who love old horror movies and Giallo.