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The Bird with the Crystal Plumage Movie Review

The Bird with the Crystal Plumage is a 1970 giallo film directed by Dario Argento and starring Tony Musante and Eva Renzi. It’s a solid, but far from great genre flick.

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“Go to Italy. It’s a peaceful country,

nothing much ever happens there“

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An American writer, Sam is living in Rome with his girlfriend, Julia. While visiting an art gallery, Sam witnesses an unsuccessful murder attempt by a mysterious figure. As the assailant is believed to be an infamous serial killer, Sam quickly becomes a key witness in the ongoing police investigation. Eventually, a woman is revealed as the killer in what is a successful twist that made an otherwise standard flick at least somewhat more interesting.

I liked the twist ending, but everything before that was just okay. The beginning was also very memorable, but the entire midsection was only interesting in the killing scenes, but other than those, the movie was lacking in the storytelling department as I found its scenes of investigation repetitive and far from engaging.

Giallo movies are the Italian answer to horror, but they also combine thriller and mystery elements, and to me that mix never truly worked. Here, none of the elements were strong enough to carry the film to bigger heights as the movie is never scary, it’s not intense at all and the investigation also should have been more memorable. Again, it’s solid in all of these apartments, but never great.

The Bird with the Crystal Plumage is well shot and very well scored. Its score is very much a product of the seventies, but it works as it elevates the suspense scenes quite successfully. The direction from Dario Argento is solid, but again he continues to be an overrated director for me. I liked the title of the movie and the bird’s role in it, that was the only truly authentic thing about it.

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The characters are only okay, but the performances are quite good. Tony Musante is particularly strong in the main role and I really liked Eva Renzi in what was the film’s most interesting and most complex character.