Libido (1965) User Reviews

"They used to paint really big bums" (English subtitle)

[hwg1957-102-265704 · 6/10 · 8 July 2017]

Beginning with a quote from some bloke called Freud that is mainly irrelevant to the film that follows, four people travel to an isolated seaside mansion. It includes the current owner who twenty years before had witnessed his father kill someone in the mansion, his wife, his friend who is also the estate manager and his wife too. Then the plot unravels this way and that to a satisfying conclusion. There are only four characters in the film but even with that number the script manages to keep the viewer guessing.

The acting is good enough and Carlo Rustichelli provides a suitable plangent music score. Romy Garron's black and white cinematography is excellent, either within the mansion, along the sunny countryside or above the rocky shoreline. It's an early giallo but it's a good one.

Il fascino dell' abisso

[gridoon2024 · 6/10 · 13 December 2021]

This well-made four-person thriller follows on the tradition of such films as "Gaslight" and "Diabolique", while at the same time anticpating later gialli motifs such as the haunting music tune and the black gloves. Slow-paced first half, entertaining second half, with enough plot twists to get your head spinning. **1/2 out of 4.

Well-Made Gothic Giallo Thriller

[acidburn-10 · 7/10 · 6 February 2023]

'Libido' is a slick and stylish gothic Giallo thriller with a foreboding atmosphere and a well-executed narrative that sustains momentum right up until the chilling climax. The movie is simple yet effective with its slow and deliberate pace which may not be for everyone, but there's enough suspense and tense moments to keep you engaged and thankfully the movie doesn't outstay its welcome.

The plot = Christian (Giancarlo Giannini) returns to his ancestral home where as a boy he witnessed his father murder a young woman and now as a man he's plagued by those memories and worried that he'll turn out the same way.

The opening scene does a fantastic job of setting up what's to come. The direction by both Ernesto Gastaldi and Vittorio Salerno is strong with an interesting and well written premise. The cast performances are also strong with Giancarlo Giannini providing a great and believable lead with a very captivating performance. Dominique Boschero is also fantastic in her role as the wife. Mara Maryl is a standout in her role as Bridgette and finally Luciano Pigozzi also gives a solid performance and rounds off this small cast rather well.

Overall 'Libido' is a solid Giallo thriller that fans of the genre should check out if you're a fan of well-made psychological thrillers.

Early B and W Giallo, Definitely Recommended

[lazarillo · 12 April 2006]

Even with all the renewed interest in Italian gialli these days, it's a little unfortunate that this one will probably never be re-released on DVD because it is one of the few gialli filmed in black and white. And that's too bad because it is really an excellent little film. A young boy sees his father murder his mistress during a bondage session in a mirror-filled room. The father apparently commits suicide by jumping off a cliff (although his body was never found)and the boy eventually ends up in a mental hospital. Years later as a young man he returns to his childhood home with his wife, his lawyer, and his lawyer's sexy girlfriend. A number of strange things begin to happen and the man begins to suspect that his father is still alive.

For much of the movie it is tantalizingly unclear whether the man is still insane (a la "Repulsion"), the other characters are trying to drive him insane to get their hands on his father's inheritance (a la "Gaslight"), or the father really is still alive. The story is excellent and unusually logical for a giallo, and the end includes some delicious twists. Not surprisingly, the director Ernesto Gastaldi would go on to become one of the most famous screenwriters of these kind of films. Of course, he doesn't quite have the visual panache of more famous gialli directors (i.e. Bava, Argento, Fulci, Martino), but some scenes, particularly the ones in the room of mirrors, are pretty memorable.

Gianni Giancarlo is the name actor, but he was pretty young here and seems to play his role a little too seriously. The best thing about this movie though is Maria Chiavetti (Gastaldi's wife)who plays the lawyer's girlfriend. Not only does she give the movie all its sex appeal by dancing in lingerie or strutting around in a kitty-cat bikini, but she provides a lot of Marilyn Monroe-style humor. And while her blonde airhead status would seem to mark her as an early victim, she plays a big part in the surprise twists near the end, proving more charismatic and versatile than the soon-to-be-famous, but here pretty one-note, Giancarlo. And she also apparently was the one that came up with the original idea for the story. This is impressive film, and the version I saw (in Italian with English subtitles) looked great.

A fun, sexy '60s thriller,

[BA_Harrison · 7/10 · 10 December 2023]

With a six letter title ending in 'O' and a central character who is clearly mentally unstable, I was expecting Libido to be heavily inspired by Hitchcock's Psycho, but the film actually has more in common with French classic Les Diaboliques (1955), the plot involving two women conspiring to drive a young man crazy so that they can claim his inheritance.

When Christian Coreau (Giancarlo Giannini) was a child, he witnessed his father kill a woman before committing suicide; this left Christian more than a little twitchy and fearful that he might follow in his father's footsteps. Shortly before turning twenty-five and inheriting his dead dad's fortune, Christian returns to his childhood home with his wife Helene (Dominique Boschero), his lawyer Paul (Luciano Pigozzi), and Paul's wife Brigitte (Mara Maryl). While there, Christian starts to see strange things that gradually loosen the few screws he has left.

Fans of this kind of thing won't take long to figure out what is going on (although I wrongly assumed that Paul was in on the act as well), but even though the whole thing is rather trite, it's still a fair amount of fun, not least because the two actresses are rather tasty and spend a lot of time scantily dressed. The ending is also rather neat, with several twists taking it beyond the expected. I've read several reviews calling this an early giallo, but I think that anyone hoping for such will be a tad disappointed: it's more of a mystery/thriller, and not a bad one at that.

6.5/10, rounded up to 7 for Mara Maryl's pussy cat bikini. Miaow!

Freudian thriller has many elements of early Giallo!!

[elo-equipamentos · 6/10 · 7 January 2024]

It ain't a Giallo at expense of the word properly, however the genre still crawling at this period of time, in fact primary a Freudian thriller with some elements of Giallo, that later this picture will be consider a forerunner of the unique genre, now embedded and also labeled as such, the story about a young guy (Giannini) who in tender aged saw his sexual maniac father committed a crime at his house at room of mirrors, becoming aftermaths mentally deranged, after many years of therapy he was back on old father's house to face and easy its fears, duly accompanied by his wife (Dominique Boschero) and his dubious tutor (Luciano Pigozzi) and his naïve girlfriend (Mara Maryl).

A stuck screenplay stays adrift mostly of time due the plot was summarized just in four characters, starting in slowing pace, even boring sometimes, the sexy attendance of the gorgeous Mara Maryl reliefs a little bit the sluggish narrative, a gothic offering with ups and downs indeed, the black and white photograph didn't match with Giallo genre whatsoever, the outcome is anemic due the lower scope allowed by a lame screenplay, although the sexy and flamboyant Mara Maryl makes up for stand 90 minutes long of agony.

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First watch: 2024 / How many: 1 / Source: DVD / Rating: 6.5.

Essential early Giallo

[rundbauchdodo · 8/10 · 3 June 2004]

This thriller by renowned Italian screenwriter Ernesto Gastaldi is a very early Giallo - made just shortly after Mario Bava's first modern Italian thriller SEI DONNE PER L'ASSASSINO (1964) that is considered being the first real Giallo at all. But LIBIDO, shot in black and white, is not only one of the earliest Gialli. It is also one of the most accomplished - even though it was made in less than three weeks according to Gastaldi.

Christian (Giancarlo Giannini in his first movie) returns to the house by the sea where he grew up. He's accompanied by his fiancée and a befriended couple. As a child, he witnessed his father killing his mistress before jumping over a cliff. With the return, Christian should finally overcome his childhood trauma that emerged. As soon as he is back in his old home, though, Christian sees strange things that lead him to the assumption his father must still be alive.

Only one location (the house and the immediate environment), only four actors for most of the time - plus plenty of thrills and psychological terror make this one a winner. LIBIDO starts with a quote by Sigmund Freud. It can't get much more appropriate than that, because of all Gialli, this is the most Freudian one (and there are quite a bunch). Towards the climax, the plot twists pile up, of course, and they all do not only work, but are also clever and surprising (and try to do that with only a quartet of characters).

LIBIDO is a classic of its genre - essential viewing for Giallo fans and thus not to be missed.

Really underwhelming thriller/Giallo

[kannibalcorpsegrinder · 4/10 · 18 January 2017]

Haunted by a terrible tragedy, a young man brought back to his family's old home by his wife and friends finds his long-held belief in a legacy of family-led mental disorders has come to bear when they succumb to strange happenings and must try to keep him sane in order to leave.

This was quite the troubled if enjoyable Giallo effort. What really tends to hold this one down is the fact that a vast majority of the film is based around the idea of his past coming back to haunt him without anything actually happening. It plays like a stodgy Gothic chamber-drama more than an actual horrific effort, filled with long- winded scenes of him monologuing about the past and his fears of its recurrence in his personality followed by their increasingly incessant pleas for him to regain his sanity, leaving this one incredibly dry and long-winded for much of it's running time. Even being distracted by the elaborate Gothic setting or the inviting mystery at hand doesn't really offer up much as it becomes quite obvious early on that little is actually happening with such long stretches of time between action, and the repetition of these events merely reinforces this since that's what happens for a large part of the film. Due to the lack of more traditional Giallo-based elements, that really leaves this one with the seriousness of its set-up to sustain any attention in the first half and that causes this to feel way too drawn-out for way too long throughout this section of the film. Once it becomes more involved with the idea that the father has returned and it starts in on some rather more lively antics there's some likable work at play here as the preponderance of Gothic architecture and settings makes for a suitably chilling scenario to base the kind of psychological torment-style plot that this one hinges on as it does follow the kind of stylistic plot- points needed for that kind of payoff to occur. The walk-throughs of the castle-grounds thinking back on the events he experienced as a child that plays over the whole affair, the sight of the figure off in the distance of the castle grounds who disappears before they can offer any kind of identification of the figure leaving behind only the footprints on the carpet and the later discovery of the dead body in their midst play off quite effectively here. The film really hits its stride, though, in the final half-hour which is where it really starts to get interesting with the revelation of who's behind the whole affair and their intentions which sets up some rather fun action in the house as everyone tends to reveal their true intentions all leading up to the great shock at the finale that makes for a rather nice ending. Still, the overall blandness on display does hurt this one considerably.

Today's Rating/PG: Mild Violence.

Ernesto Gastaldi's first contribution to the Giallo genre

[The_Void · 8/10 · 13 August 2008]

The great Mario Bava is often credited with introducing the Giallo genre with The Girl Who Knew Too Much, and then refining it two years later with his masterpiece Blood and Black Lace; but Ernesto Gastaldi would go on to become one of the premier Giallo screenwriters with such classics as The Strange Vice of Mrs Wardh and The Case of the Bloody Iris under his belt; and this little film is his first contribution to the genre. Libido is certainly not as 'Giallo' as Blood and Black Lace; but many of the genre trademarks are present, and it is a very nice little thriller. The film begins with a sequence that sees a young boy witness his father kill his mother inside a room lined with mirrors. His father later kills himself and the boy winds up in a mental hospital; his estate entrusted to his lawyer until the boy turns twenty five. Its years later and the boy is a man and married. He goes to stay in the old house (not really sure why) along with his wife and the lawyer and his wife. However, it's not long before he starts finding clues that maybe his father has returned...

The surreal, dreamlike quality is a feature of many Giallo's - and it's a big part of this one too. The screenplay ensures that the audience is always kept guessing and we're never sure of exactly what is going on; and this ensures that the proceedings are always interesting. The film is shot in black and white and obviously very cheaply too (the film was allegedly shot in just eighteen days for a bet), plus the fact that the copy I saw was extremely poor quality means that the cinematography is not particularly nice looking; and so the film may not appeal to the fans of the some of the higher quality genre entries. The cast is very small and features just four performers; and all of them perform well enough. Giancarlo Giannini is the lead actor and is decent in the role; although he would go on to much bigger and better things, while Dominique Boschero and Mara Maryl provide eye candy and the cast is rounded off by Luciano Pigozzi. The film is good for the duration and then things are really kicked up a gear in the final third when the twists start to come into play. Overall, Libido is a very good, if not quite brilliant Giallo, and is recommended to fans of the genre.

Gastaldi!

[BandSAboutMovies · 5/10 · 14 September 2021]

Giallo owes a lot to Ernesto Gastaldi, who wrote The Possessed, The Murder Clinic, So Sweet... So Perverse, All the Colors of the Dark, Torso, The Suspicious Death of a Minor, The Scorpion with Two Tails, The Killer Is Still Among Us, Puzzle, Death Walks at Midnight, The Sweet Body of Deborah, Death Walks On High Heels, The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh and this movie, which he co-wrote and directed with Vittorio Salerno (No, the Case Is Happily Resolved; Savage Three).

Filmed in only 18 days on a dare, this was based on an idea by Gastaldi's wife Mara Maryl, who also acted in the movie. Perhaps she'd seen Les Diaboliques or The Pit and the Pendulum hmm?

When he was just a boy, Christian (Giancarlo Gianni, Black Belly of the Tarantula) watched his father kill a woman and then hismelf. Now he's come back to the house where it all happened along with his wife Helene. The only others there are Paul (Luciano Pigozzi, who we all know was Pag in Yor Hunter from the Future) and his wife Brigitte (Meryl).

As soon as the master of the house arrives, he's seeing his father's ghost and going mad. But is it really happening? Or is someone else trying to make him lose his sanity?

Speaking of being influenced, the beginning of the film, where Christian plays with a windup toy as he watched human lives get snuffed up, had to have been a major influence on Deep Red.

It wouldn't be giallo if it wasn't confusing, so please know that this is a different movie than In the Folds of the Flesh, which also had the title Libido, and yes, Spasmo is pretty much influenced by this too, down to having a main character named Christian.

The fascination of the abyss

[Bezenby · 8/10 · 29 April 2017]

Libido is the kind of film that proves I'm totally justified in obsessively tracking down every Italian horror film I can find in chronological order, because it's a Giallo that fools you into thinking you've got the plot all worked out, then turns it all on its head, then turns it all on its head again, then boots you in the balls with a sufficiently nasty ending.

Christian is one of those unlucky kids who accidentally witnesses his father murdering some floozy in a mirrored room. Seems his dad took a header off a cliff shortly afterwards, leaving his creepy mansion in the hands of Paul until Christian turns 23 in three months time. Now the time is closing in, Christian, and his wife, and Paul, and his really, really ditzy wife all head off to the mansion to do the admin before the fortune falls into Christian's hands.

Paul's wife Bridgette (played by gorgeous Mara Maryl) finds the mirrored room and wants to sleep there, so later on Christian gets an eyeful when she dances in her pants for Paul, while Christian's brain juice is getting all donked up with a mixture of desire, trauma from a flashback, and wondering how six hundred year old actor Pigozzi isn't cracking a fatty right there on screen.

Also it seems that Christian's dad might not be dead at all as his pipe turns up and his favourite chair starts moving on its own (wouldn't be a mid-sixties Italian film without all that crap happening I guess!). So is Christian mad, or is someone trying to drive him mad, or has his father actually returned from the dead to tie up another floozy? This film starts off very intriguing (the credits are played out over various images of the murdered woman) and then fools you into thinking it's a mediocre Scooby Doo type thing before making you care about characters you were suspicious about from the start. I only spotted one single clue in the dialogue that may have pointed to the ending but that was that. So many twists in this one and the dark ending makes this one of the best Gialli from the sixties I've watched so far. They should have given Luciano Pigozzi bigger roles like the one he as here - He ditches the 'Igor' type act that he had in Terror Creature From the Grave and comes across as initially a bad guy to a guy perhaps discovering too late that he been made a mug of.

One last note: Dario Argento must have had his notebook out for this one - children witnessing murders, creepy toys, kid's music - all of these turn up in Profondo Rosso!

Not Really a Giallo, Mediocre 60's Thriller

[thalassafischer · 5/10 · 16 June 2023]

Libido is okay, it's not terrible or anything, but let me put it this way: if these same characters were in a trailer park instead of a mansion this would be an episode of The Jersey Shore.

Christian is a serious and reserved man of about 30 who has recently lost his violent, mentally ill father and has inherited a large house with a beach and everything. But he doesn't seem happy about it at all, he's utterly miserable. His wife-to-be (or new wife? Unclear) Helene is also a serious woman, so you could say they're well matched and she seems mature enough to deal with his...issues.

However, there's an employee of Christian's father - probably a lawyer? Again, unclear - named Paul who is 40 something, possibly 50 but married to a much younger woman. Paul is there to oversee the estate (and Christian's mental health) for 3 months until it can be permanently issued into Christian's hands legally.

Paul's wife Brigitte is apparently intellectually disabled or has some kind of weird personality disorder, seeing that she looks 26 or 27 and acts like a 14 or 15 year old immature school girl, giggling and acting completely unaware of normal adult behavior. Paul claims she's "just a baby" but even the actress, Mara Maryl, was 26 when this film was released in 1965; she is absolutely NOT convincing as a teenaged bride.

So with this trashy woman hanging around, Christian is tempted to re-enact his father's violence and turns to Brigitte within 48 hours sharing his fantasies of strangling her. Yikes on several bikes.

This is very much a typical 1960s melodrama thriller and not at all a real giallo, even if it's Italian.

Must see for giallo fans

[jameselliot-1 · 9/10 · 28 October 2017]

Mara Maryl (Mrs. Gastaldi) is the Italian sex kitten in the style of Jayne Mansfield and Mamie Van Doren and her performance, and Dominique Boschero's performance, gives Libido its energy and forward thrust. Their easy-on-the-eyes beauty and great bodies don't help young Giancarlo Gianni forget the childhood memories that haunt him. His father was a sexual sadist who took pleasure in abusing women and Giancarlo fears he has inherited his dad's sickness. He also fears he is being haunted by his ghost. Mara's character, the wife of the ubiquitous Luciano Pigozzi (the Italian Peter Lorre), is ditsy but that's kind of a facade. Unfortunately, despite the great reputation of Ernesto Gastaldi as a giallo master, Libido is not on DVD or Blu Ray in North America and that's a bummer because it's one of the best of the early giallos. The black and white cinematography and location is excellent. It would have been less impressive in color. If you can find this film on the web or through a DVD vendor, give it a watch. Mara, as Maria Chianetta, wrote the giallo film Scorpion With Two Tails.

Libido is an elite Italian gem that foreshadows the elements leading to the later giallo explosion in popularity

[kevin_robbins · 8/10 · 17 December 2023]

I recently watched the Italian picture 🇮🇹 Libido (1965) on Prime. The storyline follows a young man who witnessed his father kill his mistress going too far with kinky sex and then kills himself. Years later after the young man's mother passes away he returns home to claim the family fortune accompanied by his wife, family lawyer and the family lawyer's wife. Things get uncomfortable as the details of the will become known and it feels like the father may not be as dead as they thought...

Codirected by Ernesto Gastaldi (Cheers to Cyanide) and Vittorio Salerno (No, the Case is Happily Resolved), the film stars Dominique Boschero (The Unnaturals), Giancarlo Giannini (Man on Fire), and Luciano Pigozzi (Strike Commando).

This film captures the essence of the Italian era just before the giallo explosion. The storyline kicks off dramatically, then takes a moment to establish characters and circumstances, revealing hidden motives and evolving into a compelling "whodunit." The cast includes gorgeous ladies, and the plot weaves through numerous twists and turns before reaching a brilliant conclusion. The writing stands out, combining elements of psychological thriller and murder mystery.

In conclusion, Libido is an elite Italian gem that foreshadows the elements leading to the later giallo explosion in popularity. I would give it an 8/10 and strongly recommend it for its impressive storytelling and engaging mix of genres.