The Cat o' Nine Tails

”…Romantic subplots, whodunit elements, and standard three-act plotting are all tossed out the window with a glee bordering on the sadistic, allowing Argento instead to experiment wildly within the template of a murder mystery in which form and style coexist.” - Nathaniel Thompson, Mondo Digital

A newspaper reporter and a retired, blind journalist try to solve a series of killings connected to a pharmaceutical company’s experimental, top-secret research projects

This second entry in Dario Argento’s “Animal Trilogy” found the young talent further refining his distinctive style and cementing his reputation as master of the giallo. Featuring another nerve-jangling score by the great Ennio Morricone, THE CAT O’ NINE TAILS remains one of Argento’s most suspenseful and underrated films.

When a break-in occurs at a secretive genetics institute, a blind puzzle-maker (Karl Malden, ON THE WATERFRONT) overhears an attempt to blackmail an institute scientist shortly before the robbery, and teams up with intrepid reporter Carlo (James Franciscus, BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES) to crack the case. Soon the bodies pile up, and the two amateur sleuths find their own lives imperilled in their search for the truth. Worse still, the puzzle-maker’s niece (Cinzia De Carolis, CANNIBAL APOCALYPSE) is in the killer’s sights…