Death Laid an Egg

“Here’s the general gist: Marco runs a futuristic experimental poultry farm where he (successfully!) breeds boneless chickens, the protein of the future. He also indulges in some seriously weird sexual fetishes. There is a complex triple-cross love and deceit web with Marco, his wife and her sister. It doesn’t really turn out well for most folks involved. And the whole wickedly cool/bizarre affair is set to the most staggeringly awesome Italian staccato soundtrack. The score is punctuated with a cornucopia of various actual chicken clucks. THIS MOVIE IS…. THE BEST.” - Tim League

Arguably the most insanely idiosyncratic giallo ever directed, DEATH LAID AN EGG (1968) is a true wayward masterpiece of kaleidoscopic Italian counterculture cinema. Directed by largely unsung iconoclastic auteur Giulio Questi (DJANGO KILL!; ARCANA) and starring legendary leading man Jean-Louis Trintignant (THE CONFORMIST) as a married man that may or may not be a serial killer, Gina Lollobrigida (John Huston’s BEAT THE DEVIL) as his delectable yet overly domineering careerist wife, and Swedish blonde bombshell Ewa Aulin (CANDY) as his murderous double-crossing mistress, the film is the virtual giallo equivalent to Godard’s WEEKEND in terms of its crass car crash fetishism, savage anti-bourgeois sentiments, and overall anarchic spirit. Set largely in a hi-tech automated poultry factory that breeds mutant boneless chickens.

DEATH LAID AN EGG is a socio-politically sophisticated avant-garde giallo that is more pertinent today than when it was first released in terms of its quite modern depiction of the battle of the sexes and the perils of technology. The original Italian “superbly edited” giallo version.