To be honest, despite my more than fair knowledge of the "Euro-Cult" style of film-making, I only recently became aware of this particular title – where it was even described as possibly Margheriti's best work; having watched THE UNNATURALS for myself now, I would actually be hard-pressed to disagree with that assessment: it certainly ranks among the top three efforts by this major exponent that I am familiar with, along with two other Gothic horror entries i.e. THE LONG HAIR OF DEATH (1964) and SEVEN DEATHS IN THE CAT'S EYE (1973). For the record, this is a German-Italian co-production to which the director himself contributed the script – a highly atmospheric chiller (with a séance figuring prominently throughout) yet boasting an atypical elegance due to its 1920s England setting. Interestingly, the plot more or less harks back to vintage "old dark house"-type pictures (emanating from this very era i.e. the last days of Silent cinema) and which revolved around a gathering at some remote location for the sake of an inheritance that goes terribly wrong, resulting in a murder spree; actually, this takes things a bit further (also taking advantage of the permissiveness of the age with its inclusion of by-now quite mild instances of nudity) – where the vicissitudes of the crime are slowly assembled via multiple flashbacks (unveiling various illicit affairs, both financial and romantic, into the bargain) and the whole set-up ultimately revealed to be an elaborate retribution (incorporating surprisingly neat, i.e. not heavy-handed, apocalyptic connotations) from beyond the grave! Though somewhat undercast, there are still a few familiar faces among the actors recruited for the movie – Joachim (DEAD EYES OF London [1961]) Fuchsberger, Claudio Camaso (a Tomas Milian look-alike but really the younger brother of Gian Maria Volonte' whose life ended in tragedy!), Marianne Koch (from A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS [1964] and exhibiting here lesbian tendencies which prove her undoing in both the past and present time-frames of the narrative), Dominique (FANTASTIC ARGOMAN [1967]) Boschero and, of course, Luciano Pigozzi (distinguished by his uncanny physical resemblance to Peter Lorre) in perhaps the most significant role of his prolific career. For fear of repeating myself (see the concluding statement in my AMUCK! [1972] review elsewhere), the appropriately old-fashioned strains of Carlo Savina's score provides one further reason to enjoy this – for "Euro"-buffs and adventurous movie fans alike; it goes without saying, then, that this is a title that ought to sustain a lot more than the current semi-obscure reputation I alluded to at the start...
9 Reviews
It's keeps raining, keeps raining...
Coventry13 December 2020
"The Unnaturals" isn't nearly on par with director Antonio - oh sorry, he prefers Anthony M. Dawson - Margheriti's best efforts in the genre, notably "Danza Macabra" and "The Long Hair of Death", but it's nonetheless a worthwhile and enjoyable gothic soap opera. The film benefices most from the unsettling atmosphere, genuine décors and the bright use of mandatory gothic aspects, like raging thunderstorms and enigmatic beauties. A bunch of greedy and self-centered people, each of them hiding dark secrets and/or scheming sinister plans, end up in a ramshackle old shed in the woods when their car gets stuck in the mud. Inside the cabin, a spooky old hag is stuck in a sort of bizarre trance, but her equally spooky son (Bava-regular Luciano Pigozzi) invites the guests to partake in an all-revealing séance. The pacing is often slow, and the flashbacks contain too many tedious and irrelevant parts, but the last 10-15 minutes make up for a lot. The seemingly everlasting thunderstorm causes havoc, which ensures a spectacular and unforeseeable climax.
PS: I'm not in the habit of criticizing DVD-releases, but in case you consider purchasing this film via the French label "Les Chefs-d'oeuvre du Gothique", I strongly recommend you NOT TO. Despite being quite expensive, the picture and sound quality are poor, the disc constantly falters and the audio switches back and forth between Italian and German.
PS: I'm not in the habit of criticizing DVD-releases, but in case you consider purchasing this film via the French label "Les Chefs-d'oeuvre du Gothique", I strongly recommend you NOT TO. Despite being quite expensive, the picture and sound quality are poor, the disc constantly falters and the audio switches back and forth between Italian and German.
Even some directorial flair can't save this "drawing room whodunit"
melvelvit-19 September 2015
A rich old man and his greedy group of hangers-on get stranded in the middle of nowhere when their car breaks down (in a thunderstorm, of course) and the motley crew make their way to an old dark house where they interrupt a seance that reveals their deadly secrets...
What's basically an Agatha Christie murder mystery set in the Roaring Twenties gets all supernatural in the last ten minutes but it's too little too late for anyone expecting a horror film. Although flashbacks help open things up, it's still a "drawing room whodunit" at heart with nice period detail (except for the hairdos) and a bit more style than usual for this sort of thing. The (brief) sex scenes are lesbian (were they "the unnaturals"?) but not erotic and the movie's nothing to get excited about, either, despite its reputation as one of the director's best.
What's basically an Agatha Christie murder mystery set in the Roaring Twenties gets all supernatural in the last ten minutes but it's too little too late for anyone expecting a horror film. Although flashbacks help open things up, it's still a "drawing room whodunit" at heart with nice period detail (except for the hairdos) and a bit more style than usual for this sort of thing. The (brief) sex scenes are lesbian (were they "the unnaturals"?) but not erotic and the movie's nothing to get excited about, either, despite its reputation as one of the director's best.
Big nonsense!
RodrigAndrisan5 July 2021
The Unnaturals
BandSAboutMovies26 June 2023
Warning: Spoilers
June 25: Junesploitation's topic of the day - as suggested by F This Movie- is Italian horror! We're excited to tackle a different genre every day, so check back and see what's next.
Dino Buzzati's I sette messaggeri (The Seven Messengers) is a collection of nineteen short stories in which a variety of protagonists interact with the unknown and death, often with the ending left up to the reader. One of the stories, Sette piani (The Seventh Floor) was made into a movie in 1967, while is based on Eppure bussano alla porta (Yet They Knock On the Door). In all, thirty-three movies and shows were made from the author's work.
On a stormy night -- is there a better evening for Italian horror? -- the top of London's high society of the 1920s gets stuck in the mud and forced to turn to a mansion in the darkness. Uriat (Luciano Pigozzi, a fixture in the films of director and writer Antonio Margheriti) explains to them that while they are in his home, they may use the powers of his mother (Marianne Leibl), a woman who can communicate with the dead. Yet she can do even more. She's able to tell the dark secrets of every one of them, which includes violence, deception and -- shudder, it's 1969 in an Italian genre movie -- a sapphic affair.
But they aren't the only ones filled with sin, as Uriat and his mother were once charged with two murders, which conveniently may have been committed by one of the elite in their humble abode.
Shot on sets from other films, cinematographer Riccardo Pallottini achieved the look of the seance scene by being suspended upside down from the ceiling. With camera in hand, he was slowly dropped down as he bent over backward to raise the camera and capture each conspirator's face.
Those characters include Archibald Barrett (Giuliano Raffaelli), a real estate baron who hasn't exactly made his money ethically, aided by his lawyer Ben Taylor (Joachim Fuchsberger). Ben's wife Vivian (Marianne Koch) has always come in second to her husband's career, which is why she secretly shares a mistress -- Elizabeth (Helga Anders) -- with both Barrett and his business manager Alfred Sinclair (Claudio Camaso).
Set in a decades shuttered hunting lodged stuffed -- pardon the pun -- with taxidermied wild animals, the noose tightens around each person as this film goes from a dark night haunted house film to one of near-apocalyptic intensity. That's what happens when a medium tells you, "An invincible monster will devour you all. That monster is your conscience."
Thanks to Castle of Blood and The Long Hair of Death, Margheriti -- known in the U. S. as Anthony Dawson -- was a known gothic horror quality. This just works for me, as it has a wild look thanks to all the leftover sets the director found while shooting at Carlo Ponti's studio. This is also the most that Pigozzi ever got to do in a movie, as he's as close as this has to a hero instead of a henchman or the hero's older friend. The score of Carlo Savina (Lisa and the Devil) helps this achieve more, as well.
If you thought that this movie wouldn't involve Margheriti's skill with shooting miniatures, have no fear. He's saving it for the end.
Actors picked for success in the German market playing English people in an Italian horror film based on an English literary genre. Ah, I love movies.
Dino Buzzati's I sette messaggeri (The Seven Messengers) is a collection of nineteen short stories in which a variety of protagonists interact with the unknown and death, often with the ending left up to the reader. One of the stories, Sette piani (The Seventh Floor) was made into a movie in 1967, while is based on Eppure bussano alla porta (Yet They Knock On the Door). In all, thirty-three movies and shows were made from the author's work.
On a stormy night -- is there a better evening for Italian horror? -- the top of London's high society of the 1920s gets stuck in the mud and forced to turn to a mansion in the darkness. Uriat (Luciano Pigozzi, a fixture in the films of director and writer Antonio Margheriti) explains to them that while they are in his home, they may use the powers of his mother (Marianne Leibl), a woman who can communicate with the dead. Yet she can do even more. She's able to tell the dark secrets of every one of them, which includes violence, deception and -- shudder, it's 1969 in an Italian genre movie -- a sapphic affair.
But they aren't the only ones filled with sin, as Uriat and his mother were once charged with two murders, which conveniently may have been committed by one of the elite in their humble abode.
Shot on sets from other films, cinematographer Riccardo Pallottini achieved the look of the seance scene by being suspended upside down from the ceiling. With camera in hand, he was slowly dropped down as he bent over backward to raise the camera and capture each conspirator's face.
Those characters include Archibald Barrett (Giuliano Raffaelli), a real estate baron who hasn't exactly made his money ethically, aided by his lawyer Ben Taylor (Joachim Fuchsberger). Ben's wife Vivian (Marianne Koch) has always come in second to her husband's career, which is why she secretly shares a mistress -- Elizabeth (Helga Anders) -- with both Barrett and his business manager Alfred Sinclair (Claudio Camaso).
Set in a decades shuttered hunting lodged stuffed -- pardon the pun -- with taxidermied wild animals, the noose tightens around each person as this film goes from a dark night haunted house film to one of near-apocalyptic intensity. That's what happens when a medium tells you, "An invincible monster will devour you all. That monster is your conscience."
Thanks to Castle of Blood and The Long Hair of Death, Margheriti -- known in the U. S. as Anthony Dawson -- was a known gothic horror quality. This just works for me, as it has a wild look thanks to all the leftover sets the director found while shooting at Carlo Ponti's studio. This is also the most that Pigozzi ever got to do in a movie, as he's as close as this has to a hero instead of a henchman or the hero's older friend. The score of Carlo Savina (Lisa and the Devil) helps this achieve more, as well.
If you thought that this movie wouldn't involve Margheriti's skill with shooting miniatures, have no fear. He's saving it for the end.
Actors picked for success in the German market playing English people in an Italian horror film based on an English literary genre. Ah, I love movies.
things do begin to drag
christopher-underwood15 November 2013
To be fair there were some fine moments in this, particularly towards the end, when we actually get to see the action that has been thus far only talked about. Also despite prim early scenes we suddenly get solid girl on girl scenes, one verging on the non consensual, which is unusual. Also as the film climaxes we do get some great shots of eyes, giallo style, wide and fearful but by then it has been a long time coming. Again I have to confess the early scene in the woods in the storm is very well done but once we get to the house (yes, old dark house style) things do begin to drag. There are flashbacks to another big house but it does nothing to relieve the tedium of this extremely wordy piece. Card games, a prolonged seance sequence - are you getting excited, no, not me either. Real shame because everybody performs well, there is good photography and there are enough great moments to make one wish there had been just a few more. The low score is in part to remind me that I would not want to see this again and not that this is completely without merit.
The Unnaturals
CinemaSerf30 May 2023
A group of English folks (well, German, actually) are trying to get to their home amidst the mother of all thunderstorms that is washing out all the roads. With their car stuck in the mud, they have to walk to a nearby house inhabited by "Uriat" (Luciano Pigozza aka Alan Collins) and his mother. Now this woman (Marianne Leibl) is quite adept at séances and soon the group are sitting around the table where truths will out. These truths, played out via a series of flashbacks, are unsavoury and depict some of the group as malevolent, murdering, monsters. The more we learn, the more dangerous it gets for all concerned. Will they all leave that place alive? Aside from the audio of a biblical storm the sort not seen since Noah, the rest of this is all rather cheaply cobbled together with far too much (badly dubbed) dialogue that, in the end, presents us with a sort of brutal episode of "Upstairs Downstairs". Quite why there is an English setting is anyone's guess - it seems to create additional impediments to the already rather predictably weak characterisations. Eighty minutes felt a great deal longer as it lumbered along to a conclusion about which I simply didn't care. I wouldn't bother, I'm afraid.
A stormy night of revelations.
BA_Harrison17 May 2023
The Unnaturals takes place in England circa the roaring '20s (or the late-'60s, judging by the women's hairstyles): after their car gets stuck in mud during a thunderstorm, a group of people take shelter at a nearby house, home to Uriat (Peter Lorre-alike Luciano Pigozzi) and his mother (Marianne Leibl), who is in a trance as a result of a seance being interrupted by the visitors. In order to try and bring the woman back from the 'other dimension', the guests agree to complete the seance, during which their darkest secrets are revealed.
Despite plenty of treachery, murder and a little gratuitous lesbianism (very tame by today's standards), Antonio Margheriti's The Unnaturals is quite a tedious affair, hampered by leaden pacing, a confusing narrative structure (there are quite a number of flashbacks), too much talk, and a predictable ending: my guess that the characters were all ghosts wasn't too wide of the mark. Some say that this film is one of Margheriti's best, but I much preferred Castle of Blood and Cannibal Apocalypse (hell, Killer Fish is preferable to this one).
Despite plenty of treachery, murder and a little gratuitous lesbianism (very tame by today's standards), Antonio Margheriti's The Unnaturals is quite a tedious affair, hampered by leaden pacing, a confusing narrative structure (there are quite a number of flashbacks), too much talk, and a predictable ending: my guess that the characters were all ghosts wasn't too wide of the mark. Some say that this film is one of Margheriti's best, but I much preferred Castle of Blood and Cannibal Apocalypse (hell, Killer Fish is preferable to this one).
An astonishing italian movie
paolonoto9 February 2001
It's the second time I read this page and I can't understand why Contronatura (aka Schreie in der Nacht aka The Unnaturals)is still waiting for 5 votes! In fact, I think, it's a really good italian horror, a kind of "summa" of all themes of this particular genre. The director, Antonio Margheriti (also writer, in this case) is very skillful and builds his movie around a number of impossible flash-back, that articulate a disquieting narrative of murders, guilty men, strange women...I can't speak english very well, so I can't describe in the right way this movie, but if you like italian horror, you have to see Contronatura!
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