Don't Torture a Duckling

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Brenton D. @TheaterBat Apr 21 Visually stunning yet deeply disturbing. Death of multiple children, on screen brutality, inappropriate behavior towards a young boy by a naked woman. The sound scape clashes with the landscape creating a powerful dissonance that reflects the contents of the script. Can’t say that I really enjoy this one but it is undeniably striking. See more Karl O. @GalwayK Feb 1 A wonderful examination of Christian and cultural hypocrisy . See more Dallas H @FozzieMcFly Jan 10 My gosh, what an odd rollercoaster of a horror movie. By the final act, I was sold as a fan. I enjoyed it. For most of the film's run, I kept wondering why the killer was targeting kids. But that wonderment was answered when the killer was revealed at the end. See more g j @g.username Oct 26 Fairly pointless exploitation trash with little to recommend it beyond some nice landscape set-pieces. See more DanTheMan 2 @DanTheMan2150AD Oct 14 A truly haunting exploration of guilt, innocence, and repression, Don't Torture a Duckling takes every tourist-friendly image of rural Italy and systematically drags it through a foul mire of blood, tears, and festering hypocrisy, particularly of the holy kind. As equally cruel as it is beautiful, there is a wicked undercurrent flowing through the film's relentless deconstruction of fanciful urban illusions, a bleak melodrama where violence is painful and death is a grim reality, not a lavish spectacle to behold. Despite Fulci's reputation for gore, a lot of this film's violence occurs between the frames. To maintain the mystery, most of the crimes are only revealed after they've been committed. This serves a thematic function for Fulci, who reserves the absolutely horrific bursts of violence and graphic mayhem for the deaths of the witch and the killer; neither death is shot in a typically attractive giallo fashion, instead, they are presented to us in casually vivid depictions of sheer barbarity. Fulci's direction is incredible, from his slightly off-kilter framing to the sweeping landscape shots; beauty hangs over this film like a skeletal figure of Death looms over a carcass. Combined with Riz Ortolani's hypnotic score, solid acting from its entire cast and writing that willingly engages with such thorny issues and potentially off-putting themes, Don't Torture a Duckling is an adrenaline rush of tension, throwing out everything you know about the giallo genre and replacing it with anxiety, delirium, and genuine emotion. See more Hector I @Hector1184BC Oct 14 The last of the series of four restored films re-released in theaters in 2019 that I was able to see, The Long Night of Exorcism is truly interesting. It follows a series of horrific crimes committed by children in a remote corner of southern Italy. First, we see modernity arriving, with the foreground showing a highway snaking across the region like a giant snake, at the foot of which lies a macabre discovery. The shock of modernity is quite palpable here, especially when contrasted with the traditions that persist in the region, a mixture of Christianity and remnants of witchcraft. Modernity is also present in this very modern house, which stands out in this very traditional village. This ties in with the fascinating aspect of these films, which show this new architecture still in good condition alongside the old houses, and I quite like that. This house is inhabited by a rather disturbing young woman (Barbara Bouchet) with a very suggestive, even predatory sexuality, particularly with a child at the beginning of the film. I know that it was a time of sexual liberation, but I don't think this would have been acceptable with a man. It can also symbolize temptation and urges, of course. More generally, sexual symbolism is present everywhere, both in its ostentation and in its repressed side. Repression and pretense are perhaps the most important themes. Indeed, society's outcasts are widely suspected of these crimes, and the stupidity of the crowd is amply illustrated, to the point of disgust. But what the film shows is that the worst vices may be those of people above suspicion. But isn't it also demagogic to say that the crowd takes revenge for its own vices by finding culprits among the weakest and letting the real culprits, the elites, get away with it? In any case, the film plays admirably well on these false pretenses because we really fall for it, and some scenes are so brutal that they are quite difficult to bear. A strange, dark, scandalous, violent, and disturbing film! My rating is between 3.5 and 4. See more Read all reviews

Don't Torture a Duckling

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