Frequently lauded and cited as a strong influence by the likes of Martin Scorsese, Federico Fellini and David Lynch, Kill Baby, Kill is, along with the 1963 Bronte/Sade opus Whip & the Body, the most oft-mentioned crowning achievement of Mario Bava. Those who saw Kill Baby, Kill upon its initial release (as is the case with the three auteur mentioned above) witnessed something heretofore unseen in Italian Horror, if not in cinema as a whole. Never before had a low-budget, commercial and studio film been obviously and primarily concerned with its style, perhaps purposefully to the sacrifice of all else. The producers ran out of money two weeks into shooting, but Bava and the entire cast/crew decided to keep working for free. I'd like to think that this explains the film's aesthetic – the idea that the producers (out of shame for having no money) left the artists alone to do whatever they wanted. Who would they be to demand re-shoots with no money to pay anyone?
And what style is this movie? Rural rococo? Barnyard baroque? Not since the heyday of Sternberg and Murnau had a film director been so obvious about his single-minded conveyance of artifice über alles. Ahem I'd go so far as to call it The Scarlet Empress of Italian Horror. (Hopefully Marlene Dietrich and Jack Smith aren't rolling over in their graves from that one.) It's as if Bava were contractually obligated to tell a story or have a plot in this film (he's one of the three screenwriters on this one by the way), but all he really wanted to do was perfect using his purple and green fill lights, maybe show off his exquisite low-key techniques, and go zoom-shot reverse zoom-shot 'til one's head is spinning. Oh yeah, and that new industrial-sized dry ice machine – don't forget to leave that on full blast.
The plot, which is amusingly influential in its own right, concerns the giggly, ball-bouncing ghost of an accidentally killed little girl who, through the vengeful psyche of her psychotic albeit medium mother, is terrorizing all the villagers into guilt-ridden suicide, one at a time. Though the mayor and his good-witch girlfriend-on-the-side are trying their best to outdo the nasty matron and her brat, all is so far for naught. All this is happening because the debauched and ignorant villagers were busy partying and sinning during an all-night drunken holiday, and they didn't notice that the girl (little Melissa), the Baroness Graps' daughter, was in danger. For poor Melissa got trampled by horses, and her attempt to call attention to her not-yet mortal wounds via the ringing of the town bell, fell upon gin-soaked eyes and ears. The mournful Baroness seeks revenge, and, with the help of her spectral spawn, her plan is succeeding nicely. Friday the 13th anyone ?
The Villa Graps, where the delightfully paranoid Baroness resides, is (along with William Burroughs) a clear influence on Twin Peaks' Black Lodge, with the Baroness herself (as was pointed out to me by a Kill Baby, Kill obsessed friend) the undeniable source of Grace Zabriske's genius performance as Laura Palmer's mother. Like the Black Lodge, the Villa Graps is a maddening character in its own right. And as for the banal screenwriters of the already mentioned Friday the 13th, after seeing Kill Baby, Kill and Bava's later Twitch of the Death Nerve you too may wonder why a lawsuit was never filed against them. The stunning visuals, the beautiful tracking shots, the creepy laugh of Melissa, the Baroness' hair, the pure and absurd phantasmagoria of it all – Kill Baby, Kill is Bava's ultimate proof that style could attempt to be substance all by itself. And though he denied the identity of 'artist' his whole life (he preferred 'craftsman' or 'artisan'), with this film Bava proved that his instincts and impulses were in line with the greatest attribute an artist can ever hope to have: that of risk-taker.
And what style is this movie? Rural rococo? Barnyard baroque? Not since the heyday of Sternberg and Murnau had a film director been so obvious about his single-minded conveyance of artifice über alles. Ahem I'd go so far as to call it The Scarlet Empress of Italian Horror. (Hopefully Marlene Dietrich and Jack Smith aren't rolling over in their graves from that one.) It's as if Bava were contractually obligated to tell a story or have a plot in this film (he's one of the three screenwriters on this one by the way), but all he really wanted to do was perfect using his purple and green fill lights, maybe show off his exquisite low-key techniques, and go zoom-shot reverse zoom-shot 'til one's head is spinning. Oh yeah, and that new industrial-sized dry ice machine – don't forget to leave that on full blast.
The plot, which is amusingly influential in its own right, concerns the giggly, ball-bouncing ghost of an accidentally killed little girl who, through the vengeful psyche of her psychotic albeit medium mother, is terrorizing all the villagers into guilt-ridden suicide, one at a time. Though the mayor and his good-witch girlfriend-on-the-side are trying their best to outdo the nasty matron and her brat, all is so far for naught. All this is happening because the debauched and ignorant villagers were busy partying and sinning during an all-night drunken holiday, and they didn't notice that the girl (little Melissa), the Baroness Graps' daughter, was in danger. For poor Melissa got trampled by horses, and her attempt to call attention to her not-yet mortal wounds via the ringing of the town bell, fell upon gin-soaked eyes and ears. The mournful Baroness seeks revenge, and, with the help of her spectral spawn, her plan is succeeding nicely. Friday the 13th anyone ?
The Villa Graps, where the delightfully paranoid Baroness resides, is (along with William Burroughs) a clear influence on Twin Peaks' Black Lodge, with the Baroness herself (as was pointed out to me by a Kill Baby, Kill obsessed friend) the undeniable source of Grace Zabriske's genius performance as Laura Palmer's mother. Like the Black Lodge, the Villa Graps is a maddening character in its own right. And as for the banal screenwriters of the already mentioned Friday the 13th, after seeing Kill Baby, Kill and Bava's later Twitch of the Death Nerve you too may wonder why a lawsuit was never filed against them. The stunning visuals, the beautiful tracking shots, the creepy laugh of Melissa, the Baroness' hair, the pure and absurd phantasmagoria of it all – Kill Baby, Kill is Bava's ultimate proof that style could attempt to be substance all by itself. And though he denied the identity of 'artist' his whole life (he preferred 'craftsman' or 'artisan'), with this film Bava proved that his instincts and impulses were in line with the greatest attribute an artist can ever hope to have: that of risk-taker.