By Geno McGahee
“Someone with a cock this big raped Angela Russo and threw her in the river.” – Inspector Di Salvo (Fabio Testi)
Whenever I get an Italian horror film to watch, I know that I am going to get something that is, at the minimum, interesting. The 1978 horror title of many names (TRAUMA, RINGS OF FEAR, ENIGMA ROSSO) but we’ll call it “VIRGIN KILLER”, brought the nudity that we love to see in horror films along with some over the top absurdity that I also enjoy. I like how Italy isn’t so repressed. They have no qualms about showing naked women over and over again and then more…and then just a smidge more. Good for them.
Inspector Di Salvo (Fabio Testi) is called to the scene of a murder. The 16-year-old Angela Russo was found raped and killed and it was a messy scene. In fact, it prompts Di Salvo to scream: “Someone with a cock this big raped Angela Russo and threw her in the river.” Sometimes you have to scream something like that, and he did. The case quickly consumes him and it starts to hurt the relationship with his shoplifting girlfriend, Christina (Christine Kaufmann). She steals for the thrill of it and it’s all small stuff like tea bags. Considering her relationship with a detective, perhaps it was more thrilling for her.
Emily (Fausta Avelli), Angela’s younger sister, begins feeding Di Salvo information and giving him personal items from Angela’s belongings to help with the case. That leads to her group of friends known as the “Inseparables,” and a connection to jeans producer, Michael Parravicini (Jack Taylor). The mystery thickens as other members of the group begin getting attacked and there is even an attempt on the life of the detective. Something big is going on and it might involve the school for girls that they all attend. There are plenty of suspects to choose from and every teacher seems very shady from jump. The detective has his hands full and breaks the rules to get results, leading him in many different directions.
At one point, Di Salvo gets so frustrated that he takes Parravicini on a roller coaster, knowing he is deathly afraid of heights and keeps looping around while beating him up here and there. Eventually, Parravicini spills his guts and then (spoiler) somebody spills his. When the killer is revealed, another twist is thrown at the audience, but I found it pretty predictable. Maybe I’ve seen too many of these sorts of films.
VIRGIN KILLER is a pretty good whodunit with some slasher aspects to it. It leans more toward murder/mystery than horror, but I would not shy away from putting this in the horror genre. If we were back in the VHS video store days, I would bet that this title would be in the horror section. Oh, how I miss the video stores.
Fabio Testi is awesome in this role and really is fun to watch. I also liked Jack Taylor, who looks a lot like William Fichtner. Watching Taylor freak out on the roller coaster was a thing of beauty. When Di Salvo got off the coaster, he forced the poor guy to go for another spin and he panicked again. He’s lucky it was the 1970s. The coasters nowadays would make him crap his pants. The old wooden ones are pussycats compared to the Six Flags monsters.
“Please let me off the Superman Coaster sir.”… “Fuck you.”
I recommend VIRGIN KILLER. It entertains and they even throw a dildo party in it for good measure. Dildo and good measure in the same sentence… Heaven help me.
Rating: 6.5/10
