The Killer Is on the Phone (1975)

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

It comes with great relief that I can just say right here and now that Telly Savalas is the murderer in this film. It's a different kind of Giallo, and made by Alberto De Martino, which usually means there's no cause to get too excited.This one starts with actress Anne Heywood arriving in Bruges to attend dress rehearsals for her new play. At the station, she pauses to make a phone call and suddenly makes eye contact with Telly Savalas, who seems to be stalking a diplomat. Anne faints and Telly high tails it, but something's going on for sure as when Anne wakes up she can't remember anything that's happened in the previous five years! Her sister, fellow actor Thomas, and husband George are a bit put out by this, even though it happened before when her boyfriend Peter died in a car accident five years previous. Anne can't remember nothing, not even being married as she thinks Peter is still alive and is taking part in MacBeth, not Lady Godiva as the theatre group are planning. It doesn't help that Peter's sister is in charge of everything and a total bitch. Of course, Telly realises that she may have witnessed him up to no good and resolves to take her out...Alberto De Martino is a competent director whose only fault is that his films are very slowly paced. For example, the first murder in this film occurs at one hour and seven minutes into the film! On the other hand, his films always contain scenes that kind of catch you off guard, like the goat rimming bit in The Antichrist or for a better example, the parts of this film where Anne has flashbacks that present her as a mad killer, or may just be parts of a play she starred in. This is quite effective to be honest as I hadn't a clue what was going on.Kojack is pretty good in this as he seems pretty bemused by the absurdity of the situation, and even shocks when he kicks a guy to death who had merely come to ask how he was getting on with killing that diplomat. Anne and Telly get involved in a pretty good cat and mouse situation at the end which results in a nasty end for Telly, plus further ridiculous revelations that can only occur in Italian films.

A theater actress (Anne Heywood) recognizes a thuggish hired killer (Telly Savalas) on the street and faints. When she comes to, she is suffering amnesia, having forgotten that has happened for the last five years since right before she witnessed her wealthy former boyfriend being murdered. This is a problem both for her husband of the past three years and for her theater company since she has the lead in their latest play ("Lady Godiva", quite convenient, of course, for a cheesecake-happy giallo film). The amnesia plot has obviously been done to death both within the giallo genre (i.e. "Eye in the Labyrinth", "Puzzle")and certainly outside it. Still this manages to add some new twists. At one point, the heroine has vague memories of being in bed with one of her male co-stars. Thinking they were lovers, she agrees to go to bed with him again in order to jog her memory, only to realize at the last moment (and to the poor guy's chagrin) that the memory is actually that of a scene in play they did together earlier! Meanwhile, the killer has also recognized her. He accidentally kills her sister, and he then comes after her. Anne Heywood was kind of like a British version of Carroll Baker in that she started out in fairly respectable roles when she was younger (like "Black Narcissus"), but by middle age found herself appearing (usually sans clothing)in a lot of sleazy Italian exploitation flicks. This movie is not nearly as sleazy as some of her other Italian films like "Ring of Darkness" (where she has a naked catfight with the actress playing her teenage daughter). And her sleaziest film was actually a American production "The Shaming" (where she plays an interracial rape victim who falls in love with her rapist). Telly Savalas is great here as always, even if he doesn't have much more to do than look menacing. The director Alberto DeMartino is definitely not one of the great Italian directors, but his movies are always entertaining.I really like the giallo genre so I may be a little kind to films like this. But even among the nearly two hundred gialli I've seen now, I'd rank this one solidly in the middle of the pack.

I'm a big fan of the Giallo sub-genre; so much so that I can often find things to like in even the worst of the genre. However, I'm really struggling for good things to say about this one! I often find that Giallo's which try to focus on a single character are the most disappointing, and the genre is best known for stylish and gory death scenes for a reason! The main problem with this film is undoubtedly that it's just too slow and boring, and the reason for that is simply that not enough interest is created in the lead character and her situation. The film focuses on a woman named Eleanor. Eleanor is suffering from amnesia. Her husband was murdered five years previously and she passed out at the sight of an imposing bald man named Ranko. She wakes from a coma and has blanked out the last five years of her life and doesn't recognise her new husband George. It also just happens that Eleanor is about to appear in a stage play, but ends up having to ask her sister to replace her. Eleanor continues to have nightmares about the mysterious Ranko...Alberto De Martino is not one of the better known Italian directors, and judging by the films I've seen from him; I have to say I'm not really surprised about that (despite the excellent Formula for a Murder). The acting is not really up to much either, with British actress Anne Heywood failing to impress or inspire sympathy in the lead role, while Telly Savalas does not deliver the kind of performance that previous roles have shown he can deliver. The cinematography and locations used are both surprisingly bland, which is a shame. The film reminded me somewhat of Mario Bava's disappointing Lisa and the Devil (not just because both films feature Telly Savalas), although Bava's film has a lot more going for it than this one does. Music is often an important part of this type of film also and there have been many memorable scores written - again, however, you will not find one here. It all boils down to a dull finale and overall, unless like me you are a big fan of the genre and ultimately aiming to see every Giallo ever made; I would highly recommend giving this film a miss!

Scenes from a Murder is a fairly rare giallo that I felt fortunate to have found in a used video store. The movie stars the uber-cool Telly Savalas as a stalker. The woman he's after has amnesia and has trouble remembering simple things like where she lives or that her lover died five years previous. For whatever reason, her family and friends allow her to wander aimlessly around the city. For the first 2/3 of the movie, that's pretty much all we get – a woman with amnesia stumbling around the city with the every present Savalas close behind. It's not very exciting and not very entertaining. It's not until the final third that anything really happens. The scenes of Savalas close on the woman's heels through an abandoned sound stage are effective but account for far too little of the movie. These scenes and the final revelation keep this from being a completely wasted experience.