MIMSY FARMER KILLS DARIO ARGENTO'S 'FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET'

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET Year: 1971 Rating: ***1/2

American actress Mimsy Farmer really went native after moving to France and starring in European horror flicks after merely co-starring in counter-culture melodramas (like HOT RODS TO HELL) stateside...

That is, in several of the Euro-thrillers, she would have an accent, speaking a kind of broken English, like it's not her original language, sometimes even choosing each word... very... carefully...

Michael Brandon in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

But she's not the main character in Dario Argento's FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET, where another American in ruggedly handsome Michael Brandon plays drums in the kind of prog-rock band that would soundtrack Dario Argento's signature bloody/groovy features...

And as one of the most artistic auteurs of the Giallo horror movement, Argento's human characters aren't much more important than the colorful interiors or local Italian exterior locales...

Laura Troschel (as Costanza Spada) in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Sometimes getting right down to the wire, literally in one particular telephone sequence: yet always filming inanimate objects with the kind of precision that Alfred Hitchcock would direct a murder...

Speaking of: there's one close-up death sequence by the mysteriously creepy mask-wearing, unknown-to-the-audience killer where exotic Francine Racette falls down a staircase, like Martin Balsam in PSYCHO...

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

With chaste vulnerability matching her perfect model looks, long brunette-haired Racette... contrasting Mimsy's short usual blond cut... is more of a dependably effective scream-queen, playing her cousin having an affair with Brandon, Farmer's flaky husband...

Who's been blackmailed inside a Victorian-style theater right out of Argento's plushly visual wheelhouse, and for a starring role he's a bit morose and backseat-mellow... being a rock drummer, after all... leaving some of the best moments to comic-relief gay gumshoe Jean-Pierre Marielle...

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Overall not one of Dario Argento's best, nor does it equal Mimsy Farmer's more fleshed-out (literally in some cases) features like THE ROAD TO SALINA or THE PERFUME OF THE LADY IN BLACK...

Meanwhile, the eclectic multi-character investigation process takes away Brandon's potential, or Farmer's method of speaking volumes with merely a pouting bottom lip narrowing sullen green eyes...

Dario Argento's FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

But FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET is one of those unique 1970's art-house horror-thriller-whodunnits that seems almost deliberately punishing to an audience since, by the end, everything becomes clearer...

As our otherwise passive male and female leads are finally (and desperately) pushed to the forefront — of what's mostly vibrant backdrops and visually creative camera-angled shots otherwise.

Dario Argento's FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Dario Argento's FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Michael Brandon in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer and Michael Brandon in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer and Michael Brandon in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer and Michael Brandon in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET with Mimsy Farmer

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET with Michael Brandon

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Michael Brandon and Jean-Pierre Marielle in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET with Michael Brandon

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET with Michael Brandon

Jean-Pierre Marielle in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Michael Brandon in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Francine Racette in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

From FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Michael Brandon in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Michael Brandon in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Michael Brandon in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET with Michael Brandon

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET with Michael Brandon

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Michael Brandon in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

From FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET

Mimsy Farmer in FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET