Bay of Blood, 1971
A wealthy, elderly woman named Federica (Isa Miranda) is killed in her home, staged to look like a victim of suicide. The mystery as to the killer's identity is short-lived, but as he admires his handiwork another killer shows up to take him out. Soon, these two murders escalate into a flurry of bloodletting and betrayals as locals, family members, and (naturally) some sexy teens get caught up in the mayhem.
For the first half of the film, I was only medium feeling this one. The initial murders are staged with style and substance, but then there's a lot of passive-aggressive conversations between different characters. There's also an overly-long sequence of some teens hanging out at the house. Both their conversation and the lingering, leering scene of one of the women swimming naked dragged for me. Not just because it's such an inelegant example of the Inescapable Horniness of a lot of horror films, but because the characters aren't developed and so it's kind of boring to spend so much time with a group of people who are obvious canon fodder.
But then the second half of the film kicks in and my appreciation went up several notches. Federica's step-daughter and her husband show up to investigate their disappearances, and we begin to understand--through a series of layered flashbacks--the role that each character played in the initial murder and what came after. This is just good and satisfying mystery stuff---the relationships between the characters are complex and overlap, and we come to understand that someone who is innocent of one thing may be very guilty of another. This all leads to a very darkly funny final scene that brings the film to an appropriate (albeit very unexpected!) conclusion.
Bava displays his flare for strong visuals. I particularly liked a shot of an octopus tentacle slowly reaching out from underneath a tarp.
But speaking of the octopus, my only other complaint is that this film includes several incidents of unsimulated animal mistreatment, including an impaled insect and the handling of the aforementioned octopus. That always knocks a chunk off of any rating I give a film, especially as it's a dealbreaker for ever wanting to rewatch it.
A solid horror with an engaging second half that more than makes up for a slightly underwhelming first half.