DEATH LAID AN EGG (1968)

We see random shots of people in a hotel: one man puts a bag over his head in a suicide attempt; a couple engage in sexy talk while listening to their neighbors; in a third, a man ties up a prostitute and pulls some knives out of his luggage. This man is Marco (Jean-Louis Trintignat), an executive at a chicken processing company. He and his rich wife Anna (Gina Lollabrigida) run an industrial chicken farm, but labor troubles (they have fired most of the workers) have left them with their hands full. Living with them is Anna's young cousin Gabrielle (Ewa Aulin) who serves as their secretary. Though she has a boyfriend, a PR man named Mondaini, she is having an affair with Marco--and might be ripe for a fling with Anna--and neither woman knows about Marco's possibly deadly S&M sessions. From here, the plot goes off in a few directions. To save money, the financially strapped company is attempting to breed headless chickens--and they succeed, though Marco is horrified at the outcome. Gabrielle and Mondaini are plotting to get their hands on Anna's fortune. Anna is sent an anonymous letter hinting at her husband's dealings with hookers and she determines to disguise herself as a whore and get hired by Marco to see what’s going on. To summarize any more would get into too many spoilers.

The summary details of this movie (whores, knives, headless chickens) make it sound gory and nonsensical, but it's neither. There is little explicit blood, and the chicken subplot--we do see the awful mutations--doesn't really go anywhere. Which leaves us with a nifty giallo (Italian-made sexy mystery-horror films made famous by Mario Bava and Dario Argento) filled with good looking people and fun plot twists that you don't see coming. As I approached the last 20 minutes, I wrote in my moviewatching notes that the plot was falling apart, but actually, it tightens up and finally makes sense (mostly) leaving us with a satisfying ending. The movie was rated X initially in the States, more for mood and themes than for any explicit sex or violence. The title is most unfortunate: it sounds like a goofy comedy (it was first titled Plucked, which is worse) and I passed this one over for that reason the first time it came up as a recommendation. The central trio are all quite good. I remember Gina Lollabrigada's name from my childhood; she was sort of famous for being famous. I've only seen one other movie of hers (GO NAKED IN THE WORLD) and it's terrible so I was glad to see that she actually is talented in addition to being beautiful and buxom. There's a bizarre 60s scene involving a couples-swapping game (ultimately like the headless chicken, a red herring plotline) and a dreadful discordant musical score. Favorite line, from Marco: "So we tumble into our dreams--so helpless and so full of desire." (True dat.) Highly recommended for fans of mysteries or giallo movies or 60s cinema. Pictured are Trintignat, Lollabrigada and Aulin. [Amazon Prime]