 Thanks for checking out this movie review video. This is for the 1972 Italian giallo film Your vice is a locked room and only I have the key and yes, that is the longest title for a film ever At least that I've seen if you can think of any longer ones go ahead and put it in the comments because I'd be interested to know Interesting so apparently actually the title of this film because it is so long you would think why It's actually a reference to another film that Sergio Martino The director of this film had done called the strange vice of mrs. Ward, which also stars Edwige Fennec and also had the same writer in Ernesto Gestaldi So there is that kind of reference so apparently that it was a piece of Writing that came from the apparent killer in that film that said your vice is a locked room and only I have the key So I guess they like that so much or maybe they wanted to draw some sort of parallel between the two films But I have a review for that and also just in general I have a whole playlist of giallo film reviews on my channel that you can check out They are all Spoilers because they're older films and just like this will be spoiler as well Which actually I watched it on the arrow blu-ray This isn't available on any streaming service that I know of except most likely the arrow streaming service They have their own streaming service if you didn't know so you can check that out But this was my first time seeing this film and it's not my favorite giallo film It does rank kind of lower on my giallo favorites list But I've never seen a giallo film that I've you know finished and been like oh, I that was a waste of time I never want to see that again. So even the worst giallo film I've seen is still worth it But I'm not calling this the worst. This is actually decent Like I said directed by Sergio Martino Who also directed films such as the case of the scorpions tail all the colors of the dark the strange vice of mrs. Ward torso the suspicious death of a minor the scorpion with two tails an American rickshaw which a few of those I actually have Reviews for on my channel at the moment others. I will be getting to as well. So yeah should be good Written by Adriano Bolzani who also wrote scripts for mr. X the fourth wall and the killer must kill again The humanoid and beyond justice. These are just some they have very long credits on IMDb So I just picked out a few sorrow Scabellini who wrote scripts for the case of the scorpions tail all the colors of the dark Anna the pleasure of the torment an American rickshaw and and Your next dough Gestaldi who I talked about before who wrote scripts for the vampire and the ballerina Werewolf in a girl's dormitory the whip and the body the case of the scorpions tail all the colors of the dark the case of The bloody iris the strange vice of mrs. Ward torso the suspicious death of a minor and the scorpion with two tails So obviously he's been involved in writing a lot of giallo scripts, which is interesting Now my favorite my crush my my film crush in general edwige finneck is in this film She's not like the main star of it because she shows up like over a half an hour into the film Basically, so you can't really call her like the star But you know she has a significant enough role in it and she does quite a good job in my opinion She's been in a bunch of giallo films such as five dolls for an August moon the strange vice of mrs. Ward All the colors of the dark the case of the bloody iris Anna the pleasure of the torment Strip nude for your killer phantom of death and then she was also in hostile part two apparently Which I don't remember catching her in that I'll have to go back and check that out Also luigi pistilli is in this film and he is also in a bay of blood And that was the year before this which I feel like is it's very interesting That a bill hook ends up being used as a as the murderer's weapon In this film or their primary murdering weapon at least early on Because a bill hook was used for the first murders in a bay of blood Which like I said was just a year prior and luigi pistilli was in He was also in the case of the scorpion's tail and the iguana with the tongue of fire Which I need to see those last two. I haven't seen him yet And then Anita strandberg is in this she plays arena and I saw her and I was like she looks so familiar And then I looked through her imdb credits and I haven't seen any of her stuff yet But I will be watching some of her stuff because she was in the case of the scorpion's tail and a lizard in a woman's skin Which actually a lizard and a woman's skin is back here on this stack that I'm trying to go through That's where I pulled this from I'm working on it. I'm working on it Uh, the title was a reference. Okay. I already talked about that one. Um, this pulls a lot apparently from egg around pose Short story the black cat now when I say that if you didn't already know it and you've seen this film I'm sure there's kind of a light bulb going off in your head where you're like, ah, that's why there's A black cat named satan in this and why he's so prominently featured I would say kind of too much. I think they they cut to the cat a little too much And especially when the shots aren't that interesting most of the time It's just showing his face, especially after he's been stabbed in the eye by arena Um, I get the reasoning for it, but I think it was just a little too much You didn't need to show the cat that much But if you know the story of the black cat by a ground pole, which I wasn't fully familiar with it going into the film Which is a good thing because otherwise it definitely spoils the film Uh, I looked it up afterwards knowing that it's kind of it's very much based off of it Uh, it it 100 percent rips it off basically. It's not based off it. It rips it off I mean it is that story The whole thing with the person having a fight with the cat gouging out its eye and then in the end the cat leading Police to dead bodies that that person put behind a wall in their basement It is exactly the same which is very similar also to the telltale heart by a ground pole. So just saying This film was also released as gently before she dies Eye of the black cat and excite me with an exclamation point I think this title is better even though it's super long. I just think it's interesting People having sex during the opening credits Uh, very very typical for giallo. They waste no time getting into the sex and even when they get past the opening credits It's too nudity because of that big party music and nudity, which is I mean, it's a weird beginning. Uh, no doubt, but that you know, that's what giallo does That is what giallo does Uh, I believe torso starts the same way and I think it may be the case of the bloody iris I think also starts with people having sex during the opening credits But it's a thing that happens within giallo um Man I wrote man. Olivia arrow is an abusive piece of trash. Yes. He is. He's not a good character Uh, pistilli plays it really well as just like this terrible husband slash terrible human being But obviously he's there to be like that because he's supposed to be The audience's strongest suspect as the killer. They always do that in giallo films where they have the one person that they just They just make so awful And and always has an excuse for why they're not around when the kills happen That everyone's like, oh, it's just so obvious. But you know, if you've seen enough giallo, you know, it's so obvious It's obviously not that person. So that's exactly what I was thinking early on in the film Obviously, it wasn't aliviero, but he is a terrible person. So, yeah Uh, and he's immediately shown as being terrible by forcing wine down his wife's throat at this party in front of a bunch of people And then feeling up brenda. They're made like in front of people and she was obviously very uncomfortable with it Uh, so not a good guy Um It was pretty common to like you need to understand that the amount of nudity the amount of sex in this film I know I've said this during other giallo reviews A lot of that had to do with trying to get a larger audience specifically trying to get more Uh international distribution from what I've read a lot of nudity in these italian films Were specifically put there for the japanese market Uh, because apparently that was a big selling point back then So, yeah, but in general it was a selling point to get into international markets for distribution just because porn wasn't super available back then like it is now And so a lot of people when they were seeing nudity, they were mainly seeing it through films like this Like that's how they saw sex. That's how they saw nudity. So it was more lured It was more taboo and more of you know, a drive for people to see it So the first victim fowsta Uh has a potentially romantic tie to aliviero once again making him look very suspicious And that's you know, obviously to kind of pin it on him early in the minds of the audience Then you add in aliviero and arena talking about him Getting home late that night and you realize he wasn't even around when the kill happened I mean at home with arena. So potentially he was out killing Again upping the suspicion Satan the cat shows up basically everywhere I mean obviously the reasoning for this like I said is for the black cat But um, I mean I liked that the cat was showing up But I wanted the cat to be doing things while it was showing up and I feel like that's the case early on But then once the the confrontation between arena and satan happens and she stabs out his eye It's just terrible after that because it's just you hear the yelling sound of the cat And then you just see the face and it's kind of like okay. We don't need it that much So floriana the niece Showing up takes the character of aliviero further down a terrible gross path As he ends up ogling her his niece disgusting Then she brings up the fact that he potentially was having sex with his own mother Which he neither confirms nor denies obviously this gets very kind of incestuous as floriana then has sex with Uh arena and then has sex also with aliviero And then there's also that whole thing floating out there the whole time Which nobody confirms or denies of aliviero potentially having had sex with his mother So it makes you think is it this family? Is this what this family does? And in general I feel like floriana shows up just to kind of wreak havoc to cause problems which I think Also serves a bit as making her a little bit of a suspect As potentially being involved with the murders Because she ultimately seems to really just have motivations for herself She just comes to visit and she's just like i'll just do what I want and i'm i'm gonna cause problems I did not see it coming that floriana and arena would hook up that was very Shocking for me. I was like, oh, okay, and the fact that she hooked up with her first I was just like, okay That's like pretty much the first thing she does when she shows up and down here at their villa Which looks nice by the way very nice villa very nice scenery in general in this film I like the shot of giovanna's body after she was hit with the bill hook She was a second victim when she's being dragged I don't know if she was being dragged down the stairs or if she was falling downstairs But the shot is basically like her shins to her feet, you know like falling Backwards down the stairs. It looked cool. It was a cool shot And that's the thing is you know, sergio martino has some interesting shots that show up in this film Uh, and i'll talk a little bit more about some of them later, but cinematography good directing good in this I'm a fan acting obviously is good as well I wrote down there's no better way to convince your wife that you're not a killer than by choking her Literally, there's that scene where liviero is basically saying i'm not a killer And then he starts choking arena and i'm like, yep, that's That's the way to do that. But you know, we find out in the end It doesn't matter He doesn't even need to convince arena of anything because she's behind it all Which I did not see that coming and I think they did a great job of kind of leading the audience away from that potential path um I also wrote down liviero seems to only know how to make himself look more guilty Like if if you just take stock of the film like all the times that liviero interacts with anyone In addition to being insanely sweaty feel me on that. He's always very sweaty even when he's doing nothing um He's just doing suspicious and guilty looking stuff all the time and saying suspicious and guilty looking looking stuff all the time It's just he doesn't know how not to make himself look terrible and look like a killer Uh, that's just the way he is Liviero's ends up being way more concerned about the cat satan than he is about arena It seems that satan is kind of like the last piece of his mother because satan was his mother's cat Who I think his mother was ester. I guess was his mother ester. I don't know. I was a little confused on that Who's aunt ester was aunt ester? Olivia was mother or was it his sister? I don't know. It was kind of confusing how things were thrown out I like how oliviero bones floriana and then immediately goes to arena and they bone in the pigeon coop Which by the way, that's a weird place to have sex as a pigeon coop I mean I get the whole like allure of outside because there's an allure to have sex outside for a lot of people But in a pigeon coop, this is a little weird. That's a little weird. But then again, that's giallo There's always this quirky nature to giallo films There's a cool shot that starts behind arena in a hallway And then goes around her around the corner And then gets to like the front of hers and is showing her from a front I think that shot looked really cool. It was pulled off very well And in a very smooth sleek stylish way now There are a few other shots that are done that way in the film as well And that's one of the things I really like about the cinematography directing and the camera work in general Is those kind of like moving shots that really kind of opens the scene up a little bit more shows a lot more Makes you feel as an audience member like you can see more of the place And it makes it more immersive for that reason for the audience as well in my opinion It becomes obvious to me that floriana was kind of mainly there not just to cause problems But also to get an estrus jewelry as she basically says after she helps arena get rid of Olivia's body in the basement. She's basically like, you know, I'll stick with you and I won't go to the Authorities if you give me all this jewelry and then she ends up taking off anyway Yeah So arena killed Olivia's mother I like that admission. That was a good admission Then had the guy with the gray hair killed the women He was boning just to watch him go through turmoil and then also to make him look like a killer I like those aspects as well. So she was really really tormenting him And you have no idea as an audience member until you get to the point of her admissions, which I like that As being the twist for that reason Um, when that comes up, it's just kind of like, oh my gosh, like this whole time She was looking like a victim and that's one of the things I love about this because oliviero is in this obvious, you know Abuser bully role and the whole time arena is in a very diminutive Victim role and then by the end you find out that the roles are actually kind of reversed And what was actually going on is that all the deaths were being driven by arena and she was having this guy go kill them and it was to cause emotional internal turmoil For oliviero to really, you know get at him before he she ended up killing him And also just to potentially get rid of him by having him arrested to make him look like the killer And obviously he was basically helping her out with that by Doing things that made him look like a killer and saying things that made him sound like a killer It's just an idiot So after floriana leaves, uh, that whole scene with the the motorcycle accident where the guy with the gray hair Throws the oil on the road and then you know, they they beef it on the motorcycle and They just fall down and immediately they're dead. That scene looks terrible. It's it's very unconvincing Uh, and I feel like they could have pulled that off better. That's Probably the worst scene in the film in my opinion Although I do like the touch of the guy then coming in Lighting a match and burning the bodies in the motorcycle. That was a nice touch to it Uh, as soon as arena stopped at the cliffs with her lover slash killer guy Uh, I knew he was going to get pushed off especially because they made comments about it earlier in the film Where they were out at the same place for the uh, uh, floriana oliviero and arena We're out at that same place having like a picnic and floriana had made kind of reference to how arena could just Push oliviero off the cliff basically So and that's another thing that makes me believe that floriana was just there for her and was really after the jewels And was just like I don't care about these people. Whatever. I'm here for me It's as if oliviero's mother gets revenge in the end as her cat ends up leading the police to the bodies therefore getting the revenge on arena for killing her Now, uh, I know people would assume and I did initially when I watched the film and and a little bit afterwards I assumed that when all that typing was going on on the typewriter after oliviero was already dead That just kept saying like revenge everywhere Initially, I thought it was probably the guy with the gray hair Just trying to you know scare floriana or something but I think it may have actually been intended to be the ghost of um, oliviero's mother Just saying anyone else thinks so put it in the comments because she just kept putting revenge and in the end she had her revenge That's what she was after In spirit because the cat was behind the wall yelling to signal the police to come down and find those bodies In addition to the music not being all that great for most of it sometimes the music was a little bit You know decent, but there's a lot of not so hot music in this It's also pretty over the top at times now This is something that would happen with older films and also with giallo in general But usually when that was happening with giallo films the music was better The music the actual score for this is just not that hot Especially in comparison to a lot of other giallo films Especially when you think about, you know, the height of music like things like goblin Um, and uh, nto marcon, you know people like that Um, there are some pretty poorly lit scenes in this film as well, which was another one of my issues Uh, I understand when you want to kind of like darkness, but I felt like it just wasn't pulled off very well Because there there are these very dim scenes where you can tell they need a darkness But just have it be like darkness don't just show like the slightest bit of someone and you can barely see So that bothered me. Oh, that's a small thing, you know There's some really gorgeous scenery. I already, you know mentioned that but it's very very nice Uh, and then the other thing of why again is oliviero or luigi pastilli sweaty all the time like that why I Is that a character thing? Was that a choice like or did they not have someone there to towel this dude off? I don't understand it. He was always sweaty if you go back and watch this film that dude is always sweaty It's so weird And then once again, yes that my favorite thing about this film is that juxtaposition Well, other than edwige finneck being in it because I I have a thing for um that juxtaposition of the abuser and the victim and how it totally switches at the very very end of it For what's really going on Very smartly written for that reason and as an audience member. I didn't see it coming. I did Think that the guy with the gray hair was Involved. I thought he would maybe end up just being Outright the killer which he was the killer arena didn't kill anyone except oliviero Well, and oliviero's mother, but that wasn't in The story that you first see in the film. You just find that out later. So Um, yeah, so he was the killer But I thought that was a smart idea to have him be the killer and some people may have guessed that like I did But have that not be the full story and then when it's revealed it's like, oh, but there's so much more I was like, oh, okay. Cool. So Uh, what am I going to give this film out of five stars with half stars in play? Like I said, it's not like my favorite as far as giallo films go, but I think it's a very solid Three star. Um, I was between three and three and a half. I would give it a 3.25 if I did quarters But I'm gonna go three Yeah, I'm gonna go three on this one. Uh, still enjoy it. Obviously I own it So I'll probably end up watching it again at some point But yeah, uh, there will be more giallo film reviews to come as you can see there's a bunch of them I mean, you can't see right now that that's what's in the stack But I'm telling you there are a bunch of giallo films in the stack I don't know if I'll do them all soon or later or whatever or be like a trickle But it'll happen But anyway, uh, thanks for checking this out Do me a quick favor though in addition to putting comments down here to get nerdy about giallo with me Do me the favor of hitting that subscribe button That is your way to repay me if you like this video or any video you've ever watched on my channel I don't make money doing this or anything so you can repay me by hitting that subscribe button And I do greatly appreciate it. I'm trying to build this nerdy horror community so we can talk nerdy horror stuff So anyway, I do appreciate it and also hit the notification bell if you are subscribing and you should but anyway Thanks for checking this out until next time. Keep it brutal