 Thanks for checking out this movie review video. This is for the 1972 Italian giallo film 7 Bloodstained Orchids Which I watched on blu-ray obviously now This is my very first umberto lensy directed giallo film and if you're into giallo not only this review Just know that I have an entire playlist of Giallo film reviews on my channel. I think this will be my 31st to be added there so now this one isn't gonna rank into my top ones because I've been keeping kind of a ranked list for myself of Like my top giallo films. It doesn't rank into my top It actually ranks more towards my bottom of the list But I still like it and that's one of the things is that even giallo that I'm Consuming now that's not that ranks at the bottom of my list is still worth watching and still fun and interesting Because if you you consider it films like this to still be available now so many decades later and the fact that they're from Italy Really only the decent to good ones survive pretty much So I'm sure there are other ways you can find you know ones that are super crappy But I don't know if I'm going into that quite yet. Maybe it's on point. So anyway, like I said from 1972 Directed by umberto lensy who also did the films orgasmo so sweet so perverse a quiet place to Kill knife of ice spasmo eyeball eaten alive cannibal furrow Ghost house and hitcher in the dark just to name some a bunch of those are geolos that I will actually be reviewing too Because I have the lensy baker set from Severin So I'm gonna be getting into those actually pretty soon The script was written by lensy and also Roberto Gianviti who also worked on scripts for the the conspiracy of torture a Lizard in a woman's skin, which is quite a good one I have a review for my channel don't torture a duckling also have a review for that five women for the killer That's another one and the story for this film was actually taken from a novel by Cornwall or I'm sorry Cornel Woolrich who also had Material taken from some of his novels that turned into the movies rear window cloak and dagger and original sin Which I thought was very very interesting So Rosella Falk is in this film as Elena. She's the one in the mental Institute She was also in the film the fifth chord and the black belly of the tarantula like the year prior To this film both of those geolos and I have reviews for both of those And then was in the killer is on the phone the same year as this film seven bloodstained orchids So I thought that was interesting to throw out there. She does a good job, too. She's good actress now Bruno Corazari who plays Barrett in this film Was in the strange vice of mrs. Ward just the year prior which is a really awesome Jalo film if you have not seen it you should definitely see it, especially if you like Jalo. It's a very good one So the opening music for this is kind of light and funky, but it actually has a little touch of this kind of like dark foreboding Aspect at the same time and I really like that in general I like the music in this film a lot a lot of the Jalo films have like really funky fun Music to him not all of them though, but this particular score for this one quite good Really enjoyed it would be interested to potentially listen to it on Spotify I might one day thought it was fun a lot of cool funkiness to it Which is kind of one of the things I look for in you know the scores for Jalo films So starting with the killer in this one I think is a really good way to kind of hit the ground running with the film you start by following the killer obviously and I particularly like that one shot that camera shot where his cars pulling up and It's like the cameras on like kind of the street level and the grill of the car comes like right up to the camera and then stops I thought that was a really cool shot but following the killer as he's breaking into the house and Obviously he you know the flick of his switch blade coming out on screen very cool as well not just for the look but the sound of it and then he breaks into that woman's house and you Don't really know what's going on because it's like he's gonna kill the woman who's in bed there And then he doesn't and then he pans over to a picture of a woman on the bedside table next to her And then that person ends up getting killed right after now That's the woman who was working as a prostitute who then gets beaten to death out in that kind of like field area With just a big piece of wood which is a brutal killing and once again another way to really, you know Keep the film going hit the ground running I thought that was pretty good But the aspect of him breaking in that house and then it you know having that intentional pan over to the picture of The woman gives you the idea that he's searching for someone in particular the killer and this isn't just kind of like indiscriminate killing which you know knowing it's a giallo film usually there is a very Pointed reason that the people being killed are being killed. So Although I'm sure there are some giallo out there where it's more random, but yeah And then the little aspect of the killer leaving those little Silver half moons, which we realized find out later our Front were Frank's it was a moon that Frank Saunders had been given Which I guess was like a keychain had been given by his brother who I believe was named Fred Saunders because of What that dude Raphael said who had who had the photographic memory Yeah, I think that's supposed to be a hint by the way like that little moment where he's like oh, I remember the guy It's Fred Saunders and then Mario's like your memory must be off because it's Frank Saunders. No Photographic memory Raphael was right. That's the idea that it was the brother Coming back to try and kill the woman who left his brother Frank to bleed out and dive in that car crash And he assumed that it was one of seven women who he had pulled off of the hotel register And so he was like, I don't know which one it is So guess what? I'm just gonna kill them all to cover all my bases and make sure I killed the woman who basically killed my brother So I mean not the best logic especially not for someone who's a priest like we find out in the end, but you know The shot of paint dripping on Kathy's body now she was the second one to actually be killed She was the one who had the cats When she finally gets killed she gets strangled first of all It's a nice kind of brutal killing that pops up and then it has a good kind of jump scare factor to it But when they're showing her body as she's naked laying on the ground and there's paint kind of dripping on her body On top of the blood that's there Not only is it just a cool visual because of the way they shot it But it's kind of cool because it indicates that the killing is basically a piece of the killer's artwork in a sense and That basically her dead body is the canvas and her blood is The paint in essence and I kind of like that tie in there Works really well Three supposed kills because there's the two actual kills initially and then what you think initially is a kill of Julia But then find out she actually survived, but they're you know keeping under wraps that she survived So it seems like three kills within the first 15 minutes of the film That's what I mean about like really get you know hitting the ground running and that kind of actually speaks to another Aspect of this film that I think is great is the pacing is so good This movie just moves moves moves moves moves. I never felt like there were any times really where I was sitting there was like Okay, can we get going here like let's let's pick up the pace because a lot of giallo films Even though they're all interesting to me or at least the ones I've seen They a lot of them have a tendency to have like these big lulls in the in the pacing of the film Like it's really starts to slow down They focus on these kind of weird odd things that don't really matter that much But this one I felt like it's edited really well and the pacing is just like boom boom boom boom boom Really moving and that makes the runtime of it move pretty well, which is about an hour and a half So pretty awesome When Mario goes over the photos of the minute who attended Julia's funeral, you know fake funeral with the police He stated that one man like just off-handed like kind of dismissively it was like one man He's just like oh distant relative now that made me think that it was kind of this Quick nod to who the actual killer was is like a very quick introduction, but it ended up not being right I had another moment like that which I'll talk about in a little bit, but where I was guessing and was wrong, but I Mean when I'm watching these movies like everyone looks suspicious to me I'm just like all right could it be this person do they have motive. What is their situation in this film? Let's let's figure that out It's a cool setup with discovering there will be seven victims and they're somehow connected Through the hotel register that that's basically how they figure it out. They basically say like there will be potentially seven kills So you as an audience member are like, okay, you know Three down three down if the killer doesn't figure out that Julia is still alive Four more to go. So I kind of like that as an audience member You can kind of like tick it off a sheet in essence and be like, okay Now we got four kills. Now we got five kills got two more to go. So I thought that was cool Elena's paranoia being shown in the mental institution seemed like a setup So that nobody would actually believe her when she was in actual danger which obviously that's what ends up happening the killer comes for her and she's You know been established as someone who's just always paranoid and thinking everyone's after her and just yelling and screaming about it all the time so Since that tracks already been laid Once she starts screaming and yelling no one it comes to her aid and no one will come to her aid And they even have the scene of the nurse basically being like she's at it again And meanwhile she actually gets killed which by the way how bad would that nurse feel? Think about that Speaking of Elena, I like when she faints from seeing the killer Because not just because she faints from seeing the killer and then she's drowned Which I think is kind of an interesting kill But what I like most about that is the shot like the camera shot It has the gloved killer's hands on the sides and you're seeing her Between the hands and then she faints. It just looks cool. Like this is how it's framed. It looks really good I quite enjoy it Based on the scene that the mental institution the killer is pretty athletic That's one thing I picked up on he had a really impressive escape after he you know Slashed Mario's arm when they were there He like jumped out a window and was like on the roof and then jumped down from that Like there was a lot of acrobatic stuff basically going on and I'm like, okay It can't be someone who's like old or you know Unathletics, so these are the kind of like little bits of clues You look for as an audience member try and figure out who did it But there were a lot of athletic people in the film or you know relatively fit people in the film So it was kind of like yeah, let me see if I can fix the that's lighting gets off every now and then sorry It's pretty random that the one old guy suggests Mario check where the painters hippies and vagabonds hang out To to find out about I think that was when he was trying to find out about Frank Saunders Because he was checking churches like he had been checking churches and then that one dude was like, oh, why don't you check where the hippies? Would he say that what was it again the hippies? Painters hippies and vagabonds hang out obviously because it was in the script He goes there and he gets a lead that he was looking for I think that's what leads him to bear it initially Which by the way the shot following Mario into the party at Barrett's house I thought was really cool just the movement of how it went with him It goes through like that that barrier in the walkway of the beads And then it comes around and it kind of like pans around like it follows him in and then it like looks around The camera work in this film is really good So the directing I quite like the cinematography is really nice Just a lot of these camera movements super cool a lot of fluid movements of the camera throughout the entire film that Just look great. I mean visually. It's it's quite nice That's one of the things I like about the giallo films in general a lot of them have a really nice aesthetic to them I Find the shots of Raphael and Barrett looking suspiciously into the camera pretty funny Both of them have those moments where it's just them looking into the camera and they're like You're like one of those things I you know, obviously it's over the top, but you know, this is the 70s They kind of did stuff like that wasn't really considered over the top then but it's funny now The tidbit about Frank Saunders dying in a car accident because the woman driver left him to die Creates an interesting aspect of a potential motive and obviously in the end that ends up being the motive So when I was watching it and I didn't know who the killer was They talked about that and I was like that does seem like probably the motive because they made a very Big point of talking about that with the police Can you actually tell a drug by sniffing a needle? Seems kind of absurd to me when Mario goes back to Barrett's place And he's and Barrett's like ODing on on whatever I think it was heroin was in the needle And like Mario picks up the needle and this is like sniffing it and he's like morphine. It's like You can't tell drugs by sniffing a needle I don't think but I thought that you know just another one of those quirky weird things that's funny in the film to me The drill killing in this is pretty gnarly for for the time that it came out all things considered I thought it was good I didn't I didn't expect that they would really show the drill like going in and blood like spurting out That's probably the best kill in the film in my opinion Although like the beating with the piece of wood early on was pretty brutal as well The slow scene of Julia alone in the house after Mario's arrest or faked arrest basically builds good tension Especially with the constant clicking or ticking of the clock in the background It's kind of it makes that Feeling like her time's running out as you keep hearing nothing but the ticking of the clock It helps kind of drive the tension up and then you feel like any minute now tick tick tick Here comes the killer for like you can feel it coming and yeah It's a good scene for that reason as soon as Barrett was found dead. It looked like he had hung himself I suspected that potentially the killer was the guy who was with him when Mario had gone back to his place and sniffed the needle So I was like, ah, maybe that's it because It didn't seem like he would have actually killed himself and then I thought back and I'm like well Maybe when he was ODing he didn't inject himself that guy who was with him had actually done it I think I would have liked if they went down that path, but they didn't so just sign The oh yeah, and then this quote about the suicide of Barrett his suicide was his confession I do think that's a good line like it sounds good. It's kind of it plays well But it's also like really absurd and kind of goes with something that you see in giallo quite a bit Which is the police being super lazy and just being like, oh, there's this one bit of evidence case closed We're done. We don't really care that much like they're bumbling. They're not that smart They just quit pretty easily. That's that's a theme in giallo pretty much So in the end, I believe it was the Inez Was the driver who ended up leaving Frank for dead and the half moons were the key chain that Frank had that was given to him by his Brother. Yes, so this whole time we're just trying to figure out who was the American man And in the end it is the priest it is Fred Saunders his brother and he's just hell bent on revenge I like the revenge aspect, but I don't know I do feel like the ending just kind of like had a little bit of a whimpering finish to it in my opinion I don't know Then I had this question of this when the killer is then going after Julia for the second time Why is he coming after her in his priest outfit? Because if he's smart, which obviously he's not in this He would know if it doesn't work out and I'm not able to kill her again I shouldn't be wearing the clothes of the profession that I'm in Because then people will be coming looking for priests and then they may find me like he should be disguised So I kind of think that's ridiculous. That's obviously something that was missed in the script writing of the story, but You know another quirky thing go figure Frank's brother figured. He's just he'll just kill every woman That it could have been who left his brother to die. What a crazy dude. Yeah, that's one of those things where I think it it becomes a thing where it's he's driven by the revenge initially and Then he becomes so focused on the idea of killing and actually starts to like the killing that he just Justifies to himself. Well, I guess I should just kill all these women So it's not really as much about the revenge anymore It's more about his satisfaction with actually killing women like you can tell in this like he's into it He's down with it and he's using the revenge for his brother as a way to Do more killing basically so Obviously, there's an irony of the brother the killer being a priest and then becoming an insane killer that whole thing where You know people who are of the cloth are supposed to be all high and mighty and so so good And obviously this guy is totally the opposite of that. He's the worst you could possibly be not only is he a murderer He's a serial killer. He murders many people and who knows if he wasn't caught would would he have kept going quite possibly There are a lot of good-looking smooth shots and pans And they another thing to point out about that I know you talked about that but there's a lot of cool ones where it kind of like starts with one focal point and then Kind of like smoothly moves over and focuses on another focal point in the scene like those camera movements quite like them The score is a good time like I said, but it bears repeating funky and fun I really like the score for this one and the pacing bears repeating again great pacing It just moves. It's at such a good clip. Okay, so overall I said this wasn't one of my favorites It is pretty solid though. I do enjoy it. So out of five stars with half stars in play I'm gonna give it a very solid three star rating I was between three and three and a half, but I think it feels more right at the three star rating So would love to hear your thoughts on seven bloodstained orchids down below Oh and one thing to point out is like this weird because it's seven bloodstained orchids orchids and bloodstained There's no hyphen in here, but on the title screen for this there is a hyphen and on IMDb There is a hyphen. So I don't understand why there isn't one on the front. I don't know It's just a it's a it's a very small thing But just thought I'd bring it up But give me your thoughts on this film or any giallo in general because obviously I love to talk about giallo And like I said check out the other giallo reviews I have because I have an entire Playlist and I think I might actually create a whole playlist for Umberto Lindsey as well Because like I said, I'm gonna be watching at least four more of his giallo films So I might do that as well because I already have ones for like Argento and Fulci and Mario Baba. So I'll probably do that But anyway, do me a quick favor hit that subscribe button if you like this video or any video I've ever done because that is how you support me. That is how you help me grow this horror community right here I'm not getting paid to do this I'm just doing it for the love of horror and like I said trying to grow like a nerdy horror community Especially at the moment to talk about giallo, but you know my taste change as time goes on But anyway, hit that subscribe button and also hit the notification bell because then that way you'll know whenever I'm putting Up a new video whether it's a review like this or an unboxing or a haul video or something else Yeah, anyway, thanks for check checking this out and taking your time to do that and until next time keep it brutal