Four Flies on Grey Velvet

Horrorphile

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Quattro Mosche di Velluto Grigio (Four Flies on Grey Velvet)

January 12th 2011 00:37

Dario Argento’s rarest movie, his third feature, and a giallo with some great elements, but seriously flawed by an uneven tone, some dull scripting, and ill-conceived casting. Four Flies on Grey Velvet (1971) swiftly followed Argento’s The Cat O’ Nine Tails (1971), but due to ongoing litigation between Argento and Paramount studios, who owned the American distribution rights, the movie received a very limited VHS release (an official DVD was finally released in 2009 but has been criticised as being a stitch of previous bootlegs). The Euro and limited US VHS versions have been the source of all the bootlegs, and the version I have is a widescreen letterbox English dub version, yet is still cropped on either side, features newspaper articles and signs in Italian without subtitles, and sports poor audio, still, those Argento flourishes shine through.

Four Flies on Grey Velvet Mimsy Farmer and Michael Brandon

Mimsy Farmer as Nina and Michael Brandon as Roberto

A rock musician, Roberto (Michael Brandon) is stalked and by an unknown killer who's blackmailing him for the accidental killing of another stalker, Carlo (Calisto Calisti). Roberto is plagued by a re-occurring nightmare of his own execution-style beheading, while he keeps his wife Nina (Mimsy Farmer) at arm’s length. His attractive cousin Dalia (Francine Racette) arrives, only to distract him. Roberto involves two beatniks, God (Bud Spencer) and The Professor (Oreste Lionello) and a camp private investigator Gianni (Jean-Pierre Marielle), but is everything what it appears to be?

Four Flies on Grey Velvet Francine Racette

Francine Racette as Dalia

Four Flies on Grey Velvet Jean-Pierre Marielle

P.I. Gianni (Jean-Pierre Marielle) with Roberto

Of course not, this is a giallo, there are red herrings, false turns, confusion and distraction aplenty. And this is Dario Argento sharpening his stiletto blade, so there’s a lot of style over substance. Four Flies on Grey Velvet is best enjoyed for Franco Di Giacomo’s excellent cinematography, Argento’s widescreen compositions, and for two or three set-pieces; chiefly the opening credit montage sequence, the initial stalking and manslaughter scene in the theatre, another murder sequence within Roberto’s pad, Roberto’s plaza nightmare (shown in re-occurring fragments, each one closer to the execution by sword), and the movie’s dramatic denouement and final death scene, a car crash in slow-motion.

Roberto spies his stalker

Ennio Morricone provides a less-than-memorable score (he had a falling out with Argento for many years after this movie, in which prog rock band Goblin then filled the void most impressively), but the movie’s major flaw is the lead performance and characterisation of Roberto played by Michael Brandon. Basically the guy’s an obnoxious asshole and the handsome, slightly androgynous Brandon plays him with all the charisma of a log. Both Mimsy Farmer and Francine Racette have a very modern appeal, but the homosexual P.I. is a cringe-inducing hoot, for all the wrong reasons. Bud Spencer and Oreste Lionello seem to have been plucked from a comedy, and along with the bullied postman, it is these attempts at character humour that fall flat as a pancake. Argento couldn’t make a comedy if he tried, just as Mel Brooks would no doubt fail miserably if he’d attempted a thriller.

The masked killer

It’s almost amusing to watch as Argento injects enormous amounts of visual virtuoso into moments that have nothing to do with the essential storytelling. He’s been guilty of that for his entire career, but I can’t find it in myself to condemn him for it. What is evident in Four Flies on Grey Velvet, and more so in his latter non-supernatural movies, especially Deep Red (1975), Tenebrae (1982) and Opera (1987), is Argento’s uncanny knack of infusing his movies - in particular a palpable vibe within a scene – with an otherworldy menace, it’s as if there is a malevolent alien presence masquerading as corrupt and deadly humanity.

Roberto's sun-drenched nightmare

It is Argento’s marriage of sound and image, his mise-en-scene; his command of film grammar that both mesmerises and confounds in equal measure. Four Flies on Grey Velvet may not be in Argento’s top five movies, but like all of Argento’s work pre-1988, it is still worth watching … if you can find it.

NB: The title refers to very tenuous fictional scientific investigative plot device that the last image witnessed by a dead person is burnt onto the retina and can be retrieved. The blurry image looks like four flies on a grey-white surface.

Here’s the original US teaser trailer:

Here’s the original US trailer:

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Posted By: Bryn - Category: movie reviews

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Comments

4 Comments. [ Add A Comment ]

Comment by David O'Connell

January 12th 2011 02:37

20/20 Filmsight
Screen Fanatic

I haven't actually seen this one Bryn but agree with you about Argento's predilection for style over substance - I can't condemn him or the likes of De Palma for their showy set-pieces either. The Morricone score is indeed a dull one. Love the poster!

Comment by Bryn

January 12th 2011 03:05

Horrorphile

Yes, something about De Palma and Argento that I forgive them time and time again for the limitations in either performance or scripting with their mastery of mise-en-scene and use of sound/music.

Comment by JohnDoe

January 16th 2011 22:54

Film & TV on DVD

Great review of a rare bird Bryn,

I have been meaning to check this out since it got a DVD release....on the topic of forgiving De Palma, I revisited "Femme Fatale" last night and still say its a trash diamond.