Kill, Baby…Kill! (1966)

☆ ☆ ☆

Kill, Baby…Kill! (1966) – M. Bava

The title makes this film by Mario Bava sound more gruesome and violent than it really is (although Bava was capable of plenty of gore later on).  Instead, this is a creepy ghost story set at the turn of the 20^th century in a secluded European village.  We follow a doctor who arrives at the request of the local police commissioner (also a newcomer to the village) as he discovers body after body, presumably murders but looking a lot like suicide.  Bava uses his roving, tracking, camera to take us through the village and its locales, the old inn, the cemetery, the villa Graps – all are strangely lighted (especially in green) and filled with horror movie paraphernalia (local witches, evil-looking dolls, grisly sharp objects).  The doctor tries to intervene to stop the villagers from giving into superstition and fear but even he eventually sees the source of the evil – the ghost of a young girl who died at age 7 and who is now wreaking her revenge.  Very spooky (and the actual plot is even more complicated than you need to know – a clear influence on Argento).  The Japanese view horror movies in the summer because the chills are supposed to cool you down – it didn’t work for me, but this movie had the right feel (if not an enormous number of “shocks”).