in Venice, and at R.P.A. Elios Studios (Rome).
light before an eerie house which looks very
Running time: 82 minutes (m. 220). Visa n.
much like Norman Bates’ abode in Psycho (and
8438 (.24.989); Rating: V.M.4. Release dates:
its many surrogates seen in Italian posters for
6.6.989 (Italy), .9.9 (Japan); Distribution:
the La casa series). The teenagers are surrounded
Fulvia Film. Domestic gross: n.a. Also known as:
by music sheets, menacingly floating around
Paganini Horror—Der Blutgeiger von Venedig
them. These too are stained in blood. Then, once
(West Germany—home video), Melodía de hor-
the poster was ready, all that was left to do was
ror (Argentina), Partitura mortal (Portugal).
to write the script.
82 1989: Paganini Cozzi, who had just finished penning a
The director then teamed up with Daria
screenplay on Paganini for producer Nat Wachs-
Nicolodi, who around that time was working
berger, recycled a few notions on the famous vi-
with him also on what became De Profundis—
olinist and, being an avid science fiction fan,
The Black Cat, to crank out a new script. Ac-
threw in many elements and themes from his
cording to Cozzi, “she wrote all the esoteric
favorite genre. The result was a story about a
scenes, like the one about the pact with the
haunted house where “time killed you, making
Devil.”3 The director also recycled and developed
you age or rejuvenate suddenly, turning you into
some ideas from a couple of episodes of the TV
a newborn child and then an egg cell,” and orig-
series “Turno di notte,” broadcast on Rai Due be-
inally it was to be shot in Colombia, like Con-
tween late 987 and early 988 in the TV show
tamination.2 Valenti didn’t like the script, though.
“Giallo” and on which he shared directing credits
He had Cozzi rewrite it drastically and add splat-
with Lamberto Bava—namely Delitto in rock
ter scenes in the process to make it more mar-
(broadcast on December 4, 987) and La casa
ketable. But after vainly trying to sell the project,
dello Stradivari (broadcast on December 8,
the producer just gave up the film industry and
987).
left for Santo Domingo where, according to
Cozzi got in touch with several producers
Cozzi, he set up a successful prawn factory busi-
and eventually set up a deal with Fabrizio De
ness.
Angelis of Fulvia Film, the financer of several
Lucio Fulci films. But the director’s
ambitions were soon to be frustrated.
For one thing, De Angelis made last-
minute demands which caused Cozzi
to rewrite the script all over again: “A
few days before filming started, in
order to cut costs, he told me to dis-
card all the splatter sequences, and so
I tried to rebalance the script by rein-
serting some of the weirdest and
more fantasy- oriented things from
my previous version… . The result
was definitely not a horror movie
but a fantasy or a fantastique with
lots of irony and lots of theories on
music and time,”4 as the director
summed it up. The lack of money
proved a decisive factor, too. “There
I was with this beautiful, ambitious
script and they handed me a 6mm
camera, which was broken, gave me
a villa to set the story in, and said,
‘Start shooting!’ In conditions like
these, not even the best film director
in the world could have done any
better.”
Shot in three and a half weeks,
Paganini Horror6 may not be “the
poorest film in the history of cin-
ema” as the director labeled it, but
its low budget is evident throughout,
as is its haphazard nature. Still, the
experience on the set of Nosferatu a
Venezia proved fruitful when it
Italian poster for Luigi Cozzi’s Paganini Horror (1989) (art by
came to shoot on location in Venice,
enzo sciotti).
as the director found a couple of in-
1989: Paganini
83
teresting locations for the scene where a music
the Devil” or other famous tunes connected with
sheet with a composition penned by Paganini,
the Horned One, the characters finds nothing
and kept inside a suitcase whose combination is
better than name- dropping Michael Jackson’s
666, is purchased from the mysterious Mr. Pick-
“Thriller.” In a scene, Silvia recalls the violinist’s
ett. As the film’s guest star and main selling point
devilish pact as follows: “He signed the deal in
for the foreign markets, Donald Pleasence (an-
a Venetian house and then he killed Antonia,
other survivor from the exhausting experience
his wife, and from her intestines he made the
of Nosferatu a Venezia) has very little to do, ex-
strings of that gilded violin which since then was
cept looking British and devilish. He has the
always his own. An instrument which emitted
most amusing scene, though, throwing a
unique notes when played, probably because its
handful of bills from a Venice bell tower, mum-
strings contained the soul and the desperation
bling about “little devils.”
of that poor woman.” The only true bit of infor-
The opening scenes, which follow a little
mation here is the name of Paganini’s wife, An-
girl (Cozzi’s own daughter, Giada) coming home
tonia Bianchi, while the rest is the fruit of Cozzi
after her violin lessons through the Venice
and Nicolodi’s imagination. Namely, the story
canals and indifferently electrocuting her
of the cursed violin is lifted from La casa dello
mother while she’s taking a bath, bring to mind
Stradivari, which revolved around a Paganini
the domestic horrors of Shock and Macabro, for
piece (Le streghe), a priceless Stradivari violin
the casual transition from everyday family life
and took place in a music school called Casa del
to horror; but they also underline the shoestring
Sol, like the villa in the film.
budget, with the electrocuting effect rendered
On the other hand, for the idea of turning
through cheap optical effects worthy of the laser
a piece of classical music into a pop tune—not
battle in Roger Corman’s The Raven. Then the
an uncommon occurrence in pop music, starting
film changes tone dramatically and takes us to
with, say, Procol Harum’s “A Whiter Shade of
a studio were a mostly female rock band (well,
Pale,” with its Bach- derived melody—Cozzi pos-
sort of) is recording what sounds like a bad rip-
sibly had in mind the Italian/Swiss combo
Rondò
off of Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love a Bad Name”
Veneziano. Emerging in 979 from a notion by
and “Livin’ on a Prayer,” complete with awful
Freddy Naggiar and Gian Piero Reverberi, Rondò
980s keyboards all over the place. The scene is
Veneziano played 8th century- inspired tunes
very similar to the opening sequence in Delitto
(written by Reverberi) in baroque pop arrange-
in rock, about the search for a valuable tape with
ments. Their debut album was a Top Ten hit, and
a lost Jim Morrison song.
the covers of their records featured surreal, sci-
The inclusion of pop- rock tracks (again,
fi oriented illustrations with spaceships and au-
sort of) and visuals which ape music videos—
tomatons playing strings in the Venice canals.
an element in common with Fragasso’s Monster
For the occasion, Vince Tempera didn’t go back
Dog—gives an idea of the makers’ view of the
as far as the 8th century for the supposedly
decade’s music. It also gives away the attempt at
Paganini- penned piece which the band rearranges
jumping on the notorious rock/horror associa-
into a would- be hit: the piano- based melody
tion that was so popular in the period, from the
played by Daniel (Pascal Persiano) blatantly rips
notion of Satanic back- masking in heavy metal
off Electric Light Orchestra’s “Twilight,” included
songs to the nefarious influence of rock music
in their 98 album Time.
on teenagers’ minds. The growing popularity of
In one of Cozzi’s recurring nods to his
hard rock and heavy metal even spawned a hor-
friend Dario Argento, the band hires “the world’s
ror subgenre which dated back to Terror on
most famous horror movie director” to shoot the
Tour, and Cozzi certainly knew Trick or Treat
video for the song. The in- joke possibly refers to
(986, Charles Martin Smith), which had been
Opera, where Ian Charleson played a horror
released theatrically in Italy as well.
filmmaker called to direct Verdi’s Macbeth on
Paganini, with the many legends surround-
stage, an occurrence in turn inspired by Argento’s
ing his existence, was the perfect figure to in-
own unfortunate experience when in 98 he was
carnate the pact with the Devil. The script men-
hired to direct the Rigoletto for the Sferisterio
tions Paganini’s “secret music which he used to
theater in Macerata, which he attempted to turn
summon Satan,” even though the references to
into a Grand Guignol opera, with gimmicks wor-
the present are debatable to say the least: instead
thy of William Castle. Eventually his idea was
of mentioning the Rolling Stones’ “Sympathy for
discarded, causing him to resign7 and turn
84 1989: Paganini Opera into some sort of cinematic revenge. But
mone—the role was originally to be played by
when the renowned Mark Singer (Pietro Gen-
Cinzia Farolfi.8 Overall, though, the story never
uardi, looking like a distant relative of Urbano
really adds up, at least in the Italian theatrical
Barberini’s character in Opera) shows up to
cut. At dawn the masked stalker dissolves into
shoot the allegedly expensive video all by him-
ashes—shaped, in one of the film’s most de-
self, with no crew and just a hand- held 6mm
mented ideas, as a treble clef!—like Nosferatu,
camera, it is hard to keep a straight face—and
but it remains unclear who it really is. Similarly,
perhaps Cozzi was just putting on screen what
a character wondering whether the house is ac-
was happening to him on Paganini Horror, sad-
tually hell is met elusively by the one who might
dled with a villa and a (broken) 6mm camera.
be the most suited to answer, Mr. Pickett. And
Likewise, the would- be trendy visual style of the
despite the circular ending, with a new group of
music video sequence clashes against lack of
unfortunate victims entering Paganini’s house
means and looks very much like the work of Al
and heading for (presumably) another night of
Festa (Gipsy Angel, 990; Fatal Frames—Fo-
horror, the whole discourse about time and
togrammi mortali, 996), all wide- angle shots,
music just sounds like mumbo- jumbo.
cheap filters and dry ice.
The alternate version (included on the Ger-
The more its story develops, the more Pa-
man DVD) is more interesting in this respect,
ganini Horror reveals its slapdash nature. There
as it includes bits and scenes that make Cozzi’s
are too many ideas, some of them half- baked,
claims about the film’s science fiction core more
others which would have been better discarded,
coherent and clear. Before the opening credits,
and the paucity of means just cannot sustain
in fact, we see shots of a planet and an hourglass
such a muddled plot. We have a masked, black-
floating in space; the latter, a surreal image in
gloved figure stalking the corridors that looks
tune with Cozzi’s most personal efforts such as
like it was lifted from an Argento film, gorily
the two Hercules movies, introduces the theme
stabbing its victims with a blade coming out of
of warped time right at the start, and it will be
a violin. There are the nods to Mario Bava (di-
reprised near the end. Similarly, inserts of
rectly or by way of Argento’s Inferno), such as
planets rotating in space are interspersed with
mannequins wearing multi- colored veils, and
the scene of the victims hearing a mysterious
rooms lighted with bright reds and blues (a suit-
sound: Sylvia’s monologue about the “harmony
ably eerie scene involves a cobweb- ridden hour-
of the spheres” becomes more clearly linked
glass which has seemingly stopped). There is
with the plot, as does the connection between
also room for assorted borrowings: a sheet of
the harmony of the universe and the disruption
music flying away by itself as if animated by a
of time and space coordinates inside the haunted
spiteful force recalls Tourneur’s Curse of the
house. The original ending also reveals the na-
Demon (97). And, finally, there are the rem-
ture of the masked Paganini killer: after the new
nants of Cozzi’s original idea of a time loop,
tenants have entered the house, Mr. Pickett dons
which the director had toyed with in his film
the same costume as the killer and starts playing
debut Il tunnel sotto il mondo (969) and which
the violin.
was also a recurrent element in Italian Gothic
Released in June 989, Paganini Horror pre-
(think of Danza macabra). Such a concept is the
dictably did badl
y at the box- office, but carved
basis for some of the most bizarre bits: a room
a niche for itself in the Italian home video mar-
whose walls are covered with Einstein’s relativity
ket, no doubt because of its good distribution
equations; a straight tunnel which nevertheless
(on the Avo Film label) and impressive cover
leads a character back to the starting point; and
art. It became some sort of cult movie over the
an invisible barrier which prevents the protag-
years: most viewers approached it as an Ed
onists from leaving the house, causing a
Wood–style extravaganza, but there were even
runaway car to explode and crushing someone
some serious attempts at re- evaluation. Soon
to death in the film’s goriest scene.
Cozzi would return behind the camera for De
The director does his best to enliven the
Profundis, which became The Black Cat, but his
proceedings with weird shots, the camera tilting
activity as a filmmaker waned, not least because
and rotating, and he tries to milk the suspense
of the ongoing crisis of the Italian film industry.
for what it’s worth; but he can do little to
Meanwhile, in 989 he started a new commercial
improve upon the horrible acting on the part of
venture: he and Argento opened a shop in Rome
most cast members, especially Jasmine Mai-
dedicated entirely to horror in all its forms, the
1989: Streghe
8
aptly named “Profondo Rosso,” which soon be-
Hirby (Maria Hayes), Gary Kerr (Ed Hayes),
came a reference point for film buffs all over the
Suzanne Law (Rachel Hayes), Deanna Lund
country.
(Helena), Jason F. Lefkowitz (Paul), Christopher
Peacock (Ken), Stewart Penn (Bus Driver),
Notes
Richard Powell (Cop), Nancie Sanderson (Si-
mona), Michele Vannucchi [Michele Peacock]
1. Matteo Contin, “Intervista con Luigi Cozzi,” in Gor-
(Carol Hayes), Bob Bouchard (Yokel), John
diano Lupi, Cozzi Stellari. Il cinema di Lewis Coates (Rome:
Profondo Rosso, 2009), 28.
Boyd (Yokel), Kevin Kirton (Yokel), Mario
2. Luca Cirillo, “Intervista a Luigi Cozzi,” www.
Millo (Yokel), Fred ‘Big’ Price (Yokel). PROD:
palcoweb. net (http://www.palcoweb.net/Interviste/Luigi-
Alessandro Capone, Mauro Morigi, Giuseppe
Cozzi/Index.asp).
Pedersoli for United Entertainment Corporation,
3. Palmerini and Mistretta, Spaghetti Nightmares, 64.
Italian Gothic Horror Films (1980-1989) Page 56