With a title like this, how can one take Kill, Baby...Kill seriously? By recalling that it's a Mario Bava movie. Bava had a prolific career as Italy's horrormeister, a progenitor of sorts of Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci. By 1966, Bava had made such minor classics as Black Sunday, Black Sabbath, and Planet of the Vampires. Bava's stylish movies weren't always Oscar material, but they sure looked good. Kill, Baby...Kill is no exception.
In a small, secluded town in 18th century Europe, a Dr. Eswai (Giacomo Rossi-Stuart) arrives via coach. Like Renfield in Bram Stoker's Dracula, Eswai's coachman refuses to even enter the town, let alone get close to the castle where the doctor is to meet the local inspector (Piero Lulli). Eswai has been called by the inspector to conduct an autopsy on a possible murder victim. Trouble is, the townspeople don't want the good doctor to touch the body, even going so far as to try burying it and to attack Eswai as a warning.
Why? Because they all feel that the town is under a terrible curse placed on them by a young girl who died a good twenty years earlier. Apparently, the girl died in plain view of an unhelpful citizenry, and now, through her sorceress mother, is avenging herself. Anyone who sees young Melissa is doomed to die a horrible death, usually at their own hands. So you can see how some may be a little skittish about letting Dr. Eswai cut the latest body open. Don't want to irritate the ghost, you know.
The movie needed a romantic interest for Eswai, so enter nurse Monica (Erika Blanc), who was born and raised in the town but moved away at a young age - she's present just to check in on the graves of her parents, so she agrees to witness the autopsy, with the prodding of the inspector.
As I noted, the movie is characteristically stylish, with an almost visceral feel to it. The blood is there, but it's less copious than it would be in later Bava movies, like Twitch of the Death Nerve. One shot I loved in particular appears to be of a diorama of the town's main passage. The camera swoops in, and then back out, and then in, and then out, and each time it's like walking into a 3D painting. The shot is meant to imitate the perspective of a child on a swing, and it's very effective. There's also a mind-bending scene in which the doctor pursues Monica, who's being carried away; no matter how quickly he moves, he never seems to gain on his target. It's a dizzying scene.
Although there are some of the basic cornerstones of the genre - isolated town, superstitious villagers, a damsel in distress, a curse, ghosts - Bava's direction and cinematography (uncredited) mark this as a cut above your typical mid-1960s old-school horror feature. The conclusion may never really be in doubt, but the journey's an entertaining one.
In a small, secluded town in 18th century Europe, a Dr. Eswai (Giacomo Rossi-Stuart) arrives via coach. Like Renfield in Bram Stoker's Dracula, Eswai's coachman refuses to even enter the town, let alone get close to the castle where the doctor is to meet the local inspector (Piero Lulli). Eswai has been called by the inspector to conduct an autopsy on a possible murder victim. Trouble is, the townspeople don't want the good doctor to touch the body, even going so far as to try burying it and to attack Eswai as a warning.
Why? Because they all feel that the town is under a terrible curse placed on them by a young girl who died a good twenty years earlier. Apparently, the girl died in plain view of an unhelpful citizenry, and now, through her sorceress mother, is avenging herself. Anyone who sees young Melissa is doomed to die a horrible death, usually at their own hands. So you can see how some may be a little skittish about letting Dr. Eswai cut the latest body open. Don't want to irritate the ghost, you know.
The movie needed a romantic interest for Eswai, so enter nurse Monica (Erika Blanc), who was born and raised in the town but moved away at a young age - she's present just to check in on the graves of her parents, so she agrees to witness the autopsy, with the prodding of the inspector.
As I noted, the movie is characteristically stylish, with an almost visceral feel to it. The blood is there, but it's less copious than it would be in later Bava movies, like Twitch of the Death Nerve. One shot I loved in particular appears to be of a diorama of the town's main passage. The camera swoops in, and then back out, and then in, and then out, and each time it's like walking into a 3D painting. The shot is meant to imitate the perspective of a child on a swing, and it's very effective. There's also a mind-bending scene in which the doctor pursues Monica, who's being carried away; no matter how quickly he moves, he never seems to gain on his target. It's a dizzying scene.
Although there are some of the basic cornerstones of the genre - isolated town, superstitious villagers, a damsel in distress, a curse, ghosts - Bava's direction and cinematography (uncredited) mark this as a cut above your typical mid-1960s old-school horror feature. The conclusion may never really be in doubt, but the journey's an entertaining one.