By Geno McGahee
In the 1970s, Italian horror had a certain style. It was artsy and strange and that is exactly what we see in the Mario Bava film “SHOCK”. It was a slow moving film, but when it picks up, it really picks up, and it becomes a pretty scary film.
Dora (Daria Nicolodi) lives in a house with her young son, Marco (David Colin JR), move into a new home with Bruno (John Steiner), the new husband. Dora’s ex-husband is MIA and there is an aura of mystery as to what happened to him. Marco starts acting very strange, screaming “pigs” while his mother has sex with Bruno and then telling her that he “has to kill her.” Dora remains haunted throughout this film and it’s not certain if things are really happening or if it’s in her mind.
Marco continues to act strange. At one point, he re-enacts the sex he saw on his own mother before being pulled off. He then cuts out a picture of Bruno and it somehow impacts a flight he’s on, making it nearly crash. There is something strange going on and Colin JR is one of the creepiest kids ever in horror. I don’t know if it was his missing teeth or curly hair or smile with missing teeth, but he really disturbed me. The tone of the film is like that. You squirm in your seat as you watch on, but it goes from disturbing to terrifying in the third act.
When the mystery is solved and the (spoiler) murder of her ex-husband is revealed, we get some good scares. One of the coolest scares I’ve seen in a long time was a shot where the kid is running up to his mother and as he runs to the camera, the zombie father jumps up and grabs Dora. It gave me the chills. I was so impressed with that shot. It was simple but incredibly effective.
SHOCK was an impressive film that was beautifully shot and paced appropriately. It does start off slowly but it builds to a memorable climax. If you love Italian horror with all of the strangeness and shock value, you’ll love SHOCK. It’s a very good film.
Rating: 7/10
