Torso (1973)

Man, I fucking heart Legend Comics. I mean, Capes Comic Book Lounge is my main source, but...fucking Legend is LEGEND. Why? Because they have tons of schlocky horror DVDs for sale! Ummm...fuck YEAH! Reminds of of those cheap-o video stores my Dad used to take me to in the early 90's (that was back when I lived in the Los Angeles).

Anyway, yesterday I picked up Torso (1973). What a promising title, eh?

I've been picking up quite a bit of slasher movies lately. I must admit, slasher movies are NOT my forte. (My forte is something similar and yet different at the same time...which I will reveal soon!!!) I've found that I'm more of a creature movie kind of girl. I also like fucktons of blood--so much it's almost ridiculous:

Evil Dead II is sooo boss

See? Classic.

But I've been trying to expand my slasher knowledge recently. I mean, I can't say I heart horror if I know nothing about slashers, right? Well, that's not true. I know Freddy and Jason, but I always thought there was a bit more going on with those two since they're kind of supernatural. I guess the correct thing to say would be that I'm trying to expand my knowledge on regular human being slashers. There we go. Bizarre sentence to explain myself.

So what to say about Torso? There's lots of boobs flying around. There's some lesbian "sex" (mostly rubbing and intense looks). There's a very stylish scarf used as a murder weapon. And there's a lot mulling by us, the audience, as to who the real killer is.

There was also a lot of creepy leering at women from almost all the male characters, which implied that these creepy, leering men all had the potential to be the slasher. It was all very 'trust no one'.

In addition to that, we have the usual fare of slashee lifestyle mixed in with a killing or two before the superkill! near the end of the film. I'm not gonna lie, I'm totally fascinated by the slashee's everyday lives. I LOVED Jamie Lee Curtis's Prom Night disco dance. However, once the chasing, hiding and stalking starts, I find myself annoyed that no one is fucking DYING. This is mostly because I worship some crazy ass Dead Alive shit.

However...during Torso...

I was actually a bit scared.

This is due in large part to the fact that the final sequence of the movie builds the tension fucking high, for a fucking long time. It's different and similar to the other slashers I've seen. Similar in the stalky way, but different in the slow buildup, totally bizarre way. I suppose I could explain it better, but it's better to see it really. One of the coolest things about the scary tension is that you don't realize it's happening until the gut wrenching final moment before the tension snaps--then you realize that you've been ripping your soda bottle label into tiny little pieces for the past 20 minutes.

Effective, Torso. Effective.

Plus, the girls of the film had rocking outfits:





Although I'm not too sure about the last one. I mean from a distance it looks okay...

...but then a closer look reveals it's true hideous nature (aka I hate that jacket).

My one tiny complaint about Torso is that it could have used more blood. But I have a high standards, if you recall: