Next!

A car cruises a city boulevard in a red light district. A blonde prostitute gets in and is driven to the edge of an airport landing field. As she disrobes, she is suddenly attacked and slashed to death by the razor-toting driver. Then the screen fades to a quote from Sigmund Freud preparing us for the worst - an exploitation film with artistic pretensions. Instead, we get a consistently unpredictable and stylish thriller that first introduces our heroine Julie (the exotic Edwige Fenech) as she descends an airport escalator. Joining her husband on a business trip to Vienna, she finds she has plenty of free time alone - a situation that leads to an affair with George (George Hilton), whose reputation as a playboy precedes him. But Julie's jet-set life quickly descends into nightmare territory as she finds herself being stalked by Jean (Ivan Rassimov), a sadistic former lover who introduced her to the joys of writhing naked in broken glass on wine-soaked sheets. As if that's not enough excitement, there's a serial killer on the loose. You might think you know where this is going but The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh (1971) continually ambushes you with new plot twists and the shocking demise of central characters midway into the film. At the same time, it delivers the goods to giallo fans with generous doses of female nudity and some well-timed jolts. Except for an edited, English dubbed version entitled Next!, distributed by Maron Films in the U.S. in 1972, Sergio Martino's seminal giallo The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh has remained an elusive title for fans of the genre in its original form until now. NoShame Films, a new DVD start up that specializes in Italian films, is presenting The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh in a sparkling new digitally remastering from the vault original 2P negative. The colors are sharp, the audio mix is clear and available in English or Italian with optional English subtitles (the latter is the way to go). This release should help boost Martino's reputation in a field which is dominated by Mario Bava, who popularized the giallo with such influential releases as The Evil Eye (1963) and Blood and Black Lace (1964), Lucio Fulci (Don't Torture a Duckling, 1972), Antonio Margheriti (The Young, the Evil and the Savage, 1968), and Dario Argento (The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970), Deep Red, 1975). Martino did enjoy some success in the U.S. with his later giallo shocker Torso (aka I Corpi Presentano Tracce di Violenza Carnale, 1973) which was distributed on a double bill with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre in certain parts of the country via drive-ins and grindhouses. He also gained some notoriety for the grisly jungle adventure, Slave of the Cannibal God (aka La Montagna del Dio Cannibale, 1978) starring Ursula Andress, which featured a repulsive sequence in which a live monkey was devoured by a boa constrictor. The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh, however, is an excellent starting point for giallo novices and horror buffs who will notice the obvious nods to other classic thrillers - a Psycho (1960)-like shower murder, a gravity-defying leap into the frame a la Wait Until Dark (1967), and a stalking in a public park which bears similarities to the opening murder in Blood and Black Lace. NoShame Films has also recently released Martino's Case of the Scorpion's Tale (1971) and plan to make more Martino titles - Gambling City (1975) and Your Vice is a Closed Room and Only I Have the Key (1972) - available in the U.S. in the upcoming months. The DVD extras on The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh include the theatrical trailer, a poster and still gallery, a 3-minute clip of Sergio Martino being honored at a retrospective showing of The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh at the Venice Film Festival, and a 30-minute featurette, "Dark Fears Behind the Door," which includes current interviews with Martino, his brother Luciano (who produced), screenwriter Ernesto Gastaldi, and leads George Hilton and Edwige Fenech, who still exude movie star glamour. The participants all offer insightful observations on the making of the film from the issue of nudity to actual locations used to recollections of their co-stars with Gastaldi providing the most humorous point of view. All in all it's a fun package that makes us eager for the next Sergio Martino release from NoShame Films. For more information about The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh, visit NoShame Films. To order The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh, go to TCM Shopping. by Jeff Stafford