Black Serenade sits at the center of what is a slasher and what is giallo. It's also the name of the masked killer in this film, who has embraced the legend of the Black Tuno, a monstrous being that punishes the stupid. Whoever they are, they have taken that even further and are killing students that cheat or don't belong in some of Spain's most well-known colleges.
Thanks to the Villains wiki, I learned that the Tuna is a Spanish fraternity that started when poor students couldn't afford an education. To get in, they sang and played songs, which made them famous. Soon, rich students who could afford to get in were joining just to be popular and were taking money from people who really deserved it. The Black Tunos killed every one of these false Tunos and as a result were hunted by the Spanish Inquisition. They escaped by creating a secret passageway at the University of Salamanca's Chapel of Students.
Whoever this killer is, they look incredible, like a giallo villain designed by a Japanese manga artist. They also have a strict code of honor, respecting those they believe are as intelligent as they are, but being brutal to anyone they feel are mentally inferior.
Directed and written by Pedro L. Barbero and Vicente J. Martín, this feels like a Spanish cover of Urban Legend but I didn't see that as a bad thing. Álex (Silke Hornillos), Trucha (Patxi Freytez), Edu (Jorge Sanz) and Michelle (Rebeca Cobos) are four students who are trying to learn who the killer - also known as the Dark Minstrel - could be and eventually getting threatening text messages from them. Meanwhile, as new murders happen one year after another series of killings, Detective Victor (Fele Martínez) takes on the case.
There are some wild scenes in here, like a drug dealing thinking his blood has become animated as the drugs kick in and he bleeds to death and a series of carvings that point to how the original Black Tuna escaped, symbols that start showing up everywhere the killer appears. There's also a scene where a cop kills a whole bunch of people in similar costumes to the killer, proving that the giallo police in every country should be defunded and the way that Dr. Loomis wildly shot up Haddonfield have been studied by slasher police departments all over the world.
Thanks to the Villains wiki, I learned that the Tuna is a Spanish fraternity that started when poor students couldn't afford an education. To get in, they sang and played songs, which made them famous. Soon, rich students who could afford to get in were joining just to be popular and were taking money from people who really deserved it. The Black Tunos killed every one of these false Tunos and as a result were hunted by the Spanish Inquisition. They escaped by creating a secret passageway at the University of Salamanca's Chapel of Students.
Whoever this killer is, they look incredible, like a giallo villain designed by a Japanese manga artist. They also have a strict code of honor, respecting those they believe are as intelligent as they are, but being brutal to anyone they feel are mentally inferior.
Directed and written by Pedro L. Barbero and Vicente J. Martín, this feels like a Spanish cover of Urban Legend but I didn't see that as a bad thing. Álex (Silke Hornillos), Trucha (Patxi Freytez), Edu (Jorge Sanz) and Michelle (Rebeca Cobos) are four students who are trying to learn who the killer - also known as the Dark Minstrel - could be and eventually getting threatening text messages from them. Meanwhile, as new murders happen one year after another series of killings, Detective Victor (Fele Martínez) takes on the case.
There are some wild scenes in here, like a drug dealing thinking his blood has become animated as the drugs kick in and he bleeds to death and a series of carvings that point to how the original Black Tuna escaped, symbols that start showing up everywhere the killer appears. There's also a scene where a cop kills a whole bunch of people in similar costumes to the killer, proving that the giallo police in every country should be defunded and the way that Dr. Loomis wildly shot up Haddonfield have been studied by slasher police departments all over the world.