A fashion house provides the colourful backdrop for a whirlwind of scandals, secrets, drugs and violent killings that all revolve around the mysterious missing pages of a murdered girl’s diary. Having created a milder template for the giallo movie with The Girl Who Knew Too Much, Mario Bava’s renowned and savage Blood and Black Lace is a true explosion of style and extravagance that set the bar extremely high for the genre, establishing a blueprint for all other giallo films that follow: deep primary colours, black gloved killers, a large cast of potential murderers, plenty of red herrings, and most importantly some wonderfully choreographed and stylishly violent murder set-pieces.
Bava’s deep understanding of camerawork and technique shows up here strongest among all his films, crafting such an elegant and beautiful looking film that it’s not hard to see why it set the standard for so many filmmakers who would follow in its footsteps.
