Review of Violent Midnight (1963) by Allen R — 26 Oct 2011

This mean-spirited little picture plays as a sort of proto-giallo, and seems like the direct inspiration for Argento's DEEP RED. All the hallmarks of the genre are here from an ambiguous opening set in the past, torchered artists as everyman amateur sleuths, gloved killers in trench coats, a mountain of sexual dysfunction (some of which gets pretty damned creepy), and a whodunit element that isn't very complicated, but pretty twisted for the era.