REVIEW: DON'T TORTURE A DUCKLING
REVIEW: NON SI SEVIZIA UN PAPERINO
PRODUCTION: LUCIO FULCI [ 1972 ] 102'
PRODUCTION: MEDUSA PRODUZIONE
CAST: FLORINDA BOLKAN, BARBARA BOUCHET
CAST: TOMAS MILIAN, IRENE PAPAS
PERSONAL RATING:
CRITICAL RATING:
WTF-FILMOMETER: NO EYES WERE HARMED DURING THE MAKING OF THIS FILM

Up until recently, Italian director Lucio Fulci has always been represented by his gore films from 1979 to 1981 and it's safe to say that most remember him for his work on the likes of ZOMBI 2 [ZOMBIE; 1979] and L'ALDILA [THE BEYOND; 1981]. That Fulci had been nurturing a successful career of writing and directing from the early year of 1959 is something often ignored, as are, sadly, many of the films he made in the twenty years before 1979. As such, it's easy for such classics as UNA LUCERTOLA CON LA PELLE DI DONNA [A LIZARD IN A WOMAN'S SKIN; 1971] and the film being reviewed here today to slip quietly through the cracks.

To those who have seen his gore films from the late 1970's and early 1980's and, perhaps, been a little underwhelmed, it may come as a surprise that Fulci's taught giallo DON'T TORTURE A DUCKLING is not only good cinema, by any definition of the words, but quite fantastic - possibly even the best he ever directed.

The film begins with the disappearance of the young Bruno, which brings out droves of police both native and foreign to the rural community of Accendura - three days into the search for the missing child an anonymous phone call is made to his father demanding a ransom of 6,000,000 ITL in 100 ITL notes. This makes the investigators suspicious of the sanity of the caller, since asking for that sort of ransom would, in Italy, be like demanding a comparable $4,500 ransom in dimes in the USA. The caller's intelligence is once again called into question when reporter Martelli sneaks into the investigator's interrogation of the parents and notes that to ask a ransom to be payed specifically in cash (something that should be an obvious requisite) is more than a little crazy.

A sting operation is organized and, when the caller arrives at the specified warehouse to collect the ransom, the supposed killer is captured. He turns out to be the town simpleton Giuseppe, a man known more for being an idiotic peeping tom than a danger to the townsfolk. Giuseppe leads the investigators to little Bruno's body, which is buried deep in the woods that surround the town, and continues to claim that he had nothing to do with the death of the boy - he simply found the body and, desiring to make a few bucks off the find, ordered up a ransom. The townspeople are initially enraged by the capture of the supposed murderer and flock to the street outside the town jail to cry for vengeance - the head investigator is having second thoughts however . . . Second thoughts that are confirmed when another boy - one of Bruno's friends (seen in the header image on this page) - is found murdered while Giuseppe is in custody.

Martelli begins asking around and has a long talk with the local priest - suspicions are soon focused on the beautiful Patrizia. The eccentric and hyper-sexed heiress to a big-time money-maker in Milan, Patrizia moved into Accendura after being involved in a drug scandal in the big city. A suspicious character to be sure, she spends a number of her nights driving - seemingly aimlessly - and has more than a few bizarre behaviors towards children (early in the film she is seen lounging naked and taunting a young boy who brings her a drink). Another child turns up murdered, this time the child of the caretakers of Patrizia's mansion (the one taunted early in the film), and the investigators begin to question Patrizia and her oddities - but a new suspect soon arises. . .

Local weirdo Maciara, a supposed practitioner of black magic, is soon in the spotlight. Fleeing after the funeral of the third boy, she is soon located and confesses to being the murderer. It takes time for the investigators to realize that her confession is not to be taken seriously - Maciara child, dead at birth, was dug up by the village children. As an act of revenge she created devil dolls for each, intent on killing them with black magic. Another child is murdered while Maciara is in custody - essentially proving her not to be the killer - and the local commissioners make the unfortunate decision to release her. A small gang of local men soon has her cornered and, having not heard the news of the latest murder, brutally assault her and leave her for dead.

With the real killer still on the loose and police leads drying up left and right, it's up to reporter Martelli and the still-suspect Patrizia to uncover the truth of the murders . . .

On-screen violence is slim in DON'T TORTURE A DUCKLING, something that may astound Fulci aficionados, and is limited to the brutal attack on Maciara and the final - literal - downfall of the murderer. Maciara is attacked with clubs and chains in much the same way as Schweick would be in THE BEYOND nine years later. The differences between the two scenes are like night and day, however - the attack here serves less to disgust and more to enrage the sensibilities of the audience and provides a very dark appraisal of mob justice. The aftermath of the attack sees Maciara crawling, as best she can, towards help, only to die just as she reaches the highway. It's hard for me to believe, after the number of Fulci films I've seen, that he ever filmed a scene of this sort that came close to touching the emotional impact of what is displayed here.

The script for the film, penned by Fulci, Gianfranco Clerici, and Roberto Gianviti from a story by Fulci and Gianviti, is literate and intelligent and touches on a great many social concerns. Pedophilia is less the issue here than the misrepresentation of children in society as a whole - the murderer (unnamed for the benefit of those of you who have yet to see the film) as with much of the world, has a distorted view of the innocence of the young. Fulci shows us evidence throughout the film that children are far from innocent - seen smoking, firing rocks at lizards, and verbally assaulting the local simpleton, children here are portrayed as naive, yes, but much less pure than unwittingly cruel. The overall idea seems to be that it's this obsession with the purity of the young that leads to the terrible sort of things presented in the film - a hypothesis not unfounded in reality. Mob justice, as has already been covered, gets its fair share of concern, as does the vast separation between the rural and the urban. This latter issue is evidenced in Patrizia, who lives in a vast modern mansion completely out of touch with its surroundings, predominantly, but is also on display in the out-of-town police investigators, who make the unfortunate mistake of releasing Maciara due to their misunderstanding of rural politics.

Direction by Fulci is tight and effective in DON'T TORTURE A DUCKLING and may be the film maker's finest moment - the cinematography, provided by Sergio D'Offizi is certainly well done too. Riz Ortolani, one of Italy's foremost composers (beneath only Ennio Morricone himself, perhaps) provides an exceptional score for the film. While CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST [1979] may well be his most famous work, Ortolani has composed over 200 scores in his vast and ongoing career and was nominated for Best Song Oscars in 1964 and 1971. Performances are solid all around with Barbara Bouchet, undoubtedly, being the most familiar face in the bunch. Bouchet is probably best known for her steamy scenes in the same year's ALLA RICERCA DEL PIACERE [AMUCK!], but also played such roles as Moneypenny in the original CASINO ROYALE [1967]. Thomas Milian as reporter Martelli should also be a familiar face, having more recently appeared in the films TRAFFIC [2000] and JFK [1991].

An excellent production all around, there's little for this reviewer to gripe about with DON'T TORTURE A DUCKLING. Fulci outdoes himself and, in grand opposition to his detractors, proves himself to be a very talented director after all. Never released theatrically in the United States, interest in the film has increased slightly over the years thanks to its release on a bare bones DVD by Anchor Bay (currently re-released by Blue Underground at a much more reasonable price). Fans of giallos or mystery/thrillers in general really can't really go wrong with this one and WTFFILM can't help but recommend it.