If you're not obsessed with everything giallo, don't bother!
31 December 2006
Warning: Spoilers
Step right up! Cut rate spaghetti splatter at wholesale prices! First rate? More like Z Grade. 9 out of 10? 10 out of 10?! When did we start assigning one point per plot hole on the grading scale? All you really get from this deservedly obscure little ditty is a clichéd plot, abysmal acting, tepid pacing, dreary atmospherics, poorly developed characters who do the most senseless and boneheaded things imaginable just so the movie can hop from one scene to the next, utterly contemptible dialogue, wondrous effects like a hilarious plastic model plane bursting into flames and scattered gory moments employing only the finest and brightest of "candy apple red" colored paint. So "Scorpion" is unfortunately rather pathetic and dull, just as the majority of giallos are pathetic and dull. Yet for some reason these things have a small but devoted cult following composed of people who think that if a movie was made in Italy in the 1970s that automatically makes it good. No doubt if this had been made in America or a number of other countries, these groupies would be slamming it like crazy for the very reasons I listed above. Oh well, as they often say, there's no accounting for taste.

Handsome and "smooth" as George Hilton may be, he possesses the energy and animation of a tree stump. I've never understood why he was given so many leading roles, as he comes off as incredibly pompous and makes for a stiff, unsympathetic and uninteresting protagonist (or, a-hem, surprise antagonist). Anita Strindberg shows up about midway through to play another pointless non-role and unleash her early model breast implants during the more routine passages. The rest of the cast give forgettable performances in forgettable roles. In fact the whole movie is forgettable. The plot is a tired one and involves an insurance policy being the centerpiece for a series of murders. Nothing new or interesting happens in the entire film. Martino's "All the Colors of the Dark" and "Your Vice Is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key" are far superior to this bore-fest.
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