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Lester (Brett Halsey) is a modern Bluebeard, he meets (mainly bizarre)
women, all wealthy widows, through dating agencies, courts them for a
while and when he has gained their trust, he kills them - and more often
than not in the most ghastly fashion. Then he gets rid of the bodies and
sees to it that he never leaves a trace.
Why does he do it ?
Because he has a gambling habit that grows worse and worse, but not
only that, at gambling he also is the born loser, and he constantly owes
his bookie (Al Cliver) money, to a point where the bookie threatens to
kill him.
The real problem about all of this is though that Lester is
highly schizophrenic, he is by far not as clever a criminal as he thinks
himself to be, leaves clues for the police all over the place, talks to
the tapedeck of his stereo and thinks someone is trying to do him in - and
even gets imaginary phonecalls from that guy ...
Then, out of pure coincidence, Lester, who thought of having reached
the end of the line, meets another rich widow, Virginia Field (Zora
Kerova), a woman with a harelip, and suddenly he feels himself on top
again - until he has to realize that she only lured him into a trap and
the police is already close by. She even threatens him with a gun, only he
believes she will never shoot - until, bang bang, you're dead ...
By and large, director Lucio Fulci's films from the late 1980's are
vastly inferior to his masterpieces from the early years of the decade,
especially his gothic
trilogy. Touch of Death however seems to be the
exception to the rule, as he gives up his usual, all-out horror stories
for black comedy for once, and tells a weird and also violent tale full of
bizarre setpieces - the most bizarre probably the scene where Ria De
Simone plays his latest girlfriend who constantly sings arias - and
almost ironic gorse scenes. And at times the movie is really funny (which
should not be too surprisning since Lucio Fulci got his start in comedy
back in the 1960's).
That all said however, Touch of Death is less than perfect,
somehow Fulci, while directing great isolated sequences, fails to get a
proper grip on the actual storyline, and time and again too, the film
turns into a routine but not very thought-through thriller, forgetting its
macabre overtones.
Still, in all the film is a refreshing piece of gore-cinema, certainly
not for everyone's taste of course but if you don't take your gore too
seriously, this one is definitely for you.
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