Lizard in a Woman’s Skin, A: Collector’s Edition (Blu-ray Review)
- Review Date: Sep 17, 2024
- Format: Blu-ray Disc
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Director
Lucio FulciRelease Date(s)
1971 (July 3, 2024)Studio(s)
International Apollo Films/Les Films Corona/Atlántida Films (Umbrella Entertainment)- Film/Program Grade: B
- Video Grade: B+
- Audio Grade: B+
- Extras Grade: A-
Review
[Editor’s Note: This is a Region-Free Australian Blu-ray import.]
Lucio Fulci’s extremely career has yielded a wide array of films, produced all the way up until the mid-1990s when he passed away. For most, he’s known as one of the kings of Italian gore due to the long-lasting popularity of his films The Beyond, Zombi 2, and City of the Living Dead, among others. But long before he solidified his reputation as one of the masters of Euro supernatural horror, he also dabbled in thrillers that today are more akin to his later films than one might expect. 1971’s A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin, released as Schizoid in the US by American International two years later, is a prime example of an arthouse giallo outside of filmmakers like Mario Bava and Dario Argento, who were all similar in content, but not in execution.
Carol (Florinda Bolkan) has been having strange erotic dreams about her sexually-liberated neighbor, Julia (Anita Strindberg), which she attempts to hide from her husband Frank (Jean Sorel), her teenaged stepdaughter Joan (Ely Galleani), and her father Edmund (Leo Genn), though she tells her psychologist (George Rigaud) about them. One night, she dreams about murdering Julia, and wakes up the next day to find that she was murdered for real. Though she’s eventually taken into custody, suspicion also falls on two hippies, Hubert (Mike Kennedy) and Jenny (Penny Brown), who are friends with Joan and spent time with Julia, as well. As Carol continues to lose her grasp of reality, Inspector Corvin (Stanley Baker) isn’t convinced of her guilt and must sort out the facts in order to determine who’s the one responsible for Julia’s murder.
While A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin is considered a classic Italian thriller in many circles, I’m going to speak a bit of heresy here and say that I found some of the first half to be uneven. The slow-motion dream sequences and lack of forward momentum is confusing because you don’t exactly know what you’re getting into at the outset, partly due to Fulci’s reputation as a filmmaker. It takes a while for the plot to actually heat up and get interesting, but once it does, it becomes pretty gripping. The murder sequence is surprisingly graphic, only in regards to the era in which it was made, but also because it mixes in nudity and sexuality, a taboo for nearly any censor in any time period. There’s also the infamous chase sequence in which Carol runs into a room filled with dogs that have been cut open but kept alive for experiments, which looked so real at the time that charges of animal cruelty were brought up against Fulci, and were later dismissed after make-up effects extraordinaire Carlo Rambaldi came to his defense. In truth, that moment feels far out of step with the rest of the content of the film, but it’s a moment you’re not soon to forget.
Performances are strong all around, regardless of the language spoken; there are plenty of effective scenes and visuals; and there’s a signature Ennio Morricone score. The reveal of the identity of the killer at the ending is much more somber and melancholy than it is bombastic, which actually felt refreshing, if a bit subdued. But that initial crisis of identity at the start of A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin, at least for me, made it a temporary slow going. It’s a good film, and one of the better gialli of its era, but getting over that initial hump takes some getting used to.
A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin was shot by Luigi Kuveiller on 35 mm film, finished photochemically, and presented in the aspect ratio of 1.85:1. Umbrella Entertainment brings the film to Blu-ray for a third time in its full uncut version from a restoration by StudioCanal, presented on a double-layered BD-50 disc, and encoded by Ryan Pope of Roar Digital. Note that the film opens with English language credits, as well as the title A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin, and appears to be presented in a more narrow aspect ratio. No details are given about the restoration, but it’s clearly taken from the original camera negative. Tightly-knitted grain with only minor speckling and instability are on display, with a bitrate that sits between 25 and 40Mbps. Color and contrast are mostly consistent, outside of flesh tones which occasionally look a little pale in some scenes. Blacks are deep with excellent detail, as well, though a UHD container with High Dynamic Range would definitely boost this film’s palette.
Audio is included in English or Italian 2.0 mono DTS-HD Master Audio with optional subtitles in English SDH. The English track is more full-bodied with minor hiss, while the Italian track is thinner but cleaner. As far as performances, this is a rare case where both tracks have something positive to offer, so it all boils down to preference in the end.
A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin on Region-Free Blu-ray sits in a clear Amaray case with double-sided artwork, featuring the initial US theatrical poster artwork on the front and a mock-up of a giallo book on the reverse, as well as a slipcover featuring what Umbrella describes as “Original Poster Art,” but I can’t identify it. Inside is a double-sided poster featuring the film’s Spanish theatrical artwork on the front and the US Schizoid theatrical re-issue artwork on the reverse. Also included is a set of 8 art cards and a 50-page booklet containing the essay Unraveling the Lizard’s Skin by Kris Gavin, advertisements for The Fulci Collection from Eibon Toys, The History of Eibon Toys article, the essay Swans, Guts, and Screaming Popes: Salvador Dalí, Francis Bacon, and A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin by Alexandra Heller-Nicolas, an interview with poet Atticus Frost, and a set of production credits. Everything is housed in a rigid slipcase featuring the Schizoid theatrical re-issue poster artwork, but with the A Lizard in Woman’s Skin title. This Collector’s Edition release is numbered and available in 1,000 units only. A slimmed down version minus the poster, art cards, booklet, and rigid slipcase is also available directly from Umbrella Entertainment and DiabolikDVD.com. The following extras are included:
- NEW Audio Commentary with Howard S. Berger and Troy Howarth
- NEW Lucio in a Woman’s Skin: Lucio Fulci’s Liberating Dream of Cinema (HD – 20:06)
- NEW One, No One and One Hundred Fulcis (HD – 35:40)
- NEW Down Dangerous Roads: Kim Newman on Stanley Baker (HD – 11:54)
- Shedding the Skin (with Optional Commentary by Kit Gavin) (SD – 33:48)
- When World’s Collide (HD – 29:03)
- From Burton to Baker (HD – 12:29)
- NEW Lucio Fulci Trailer Reel (HD and Upscaled SD – 75:35)
- Alternate Italian Opening Credits (HD – 1:25)
- Trailers (HD and Upscaled SD – 3 in all – 5:00)
Starting things off is a brand new audio commentary with filmmaker Howard S. Berger and author and film historian Troy Howarth, both of whom delve mightly into the finer aspects of the film and those who put it together. Next are a pair of new visual essays, Lucio in a Woman’s Skin and One, No One and One Hundred Fulcis. The former features an examination of the film by “The Flying Maciste Brothers” (Kevin Marr and Howard S. Berger), while One, No One and One Hundred Fulcis features Berger and author and screenwriter Francesco Massaccesi who dig into Fulci’s career and his techniques. Down Dangerous Roads contains a new interview with Kim Newman discussing actor Stanley Baker. Shedding the Skin is a vintage documentary by Kit Gavin, featuring interviews with actresses Penny Brown (who also narrates) and Florinda Bolkan, actors Jean Sorel and Mike Kennedy, and make-up artists Franco Di Girolamo and Carlo Rambaldi. Gavin also provides optional audio commentary. When World’s Collide interviews Stephen Thrower about Fulci and A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin. From Burton to Baker contains an interview with actor Tony Adams about his varied career.
The Lucio Fulci Trailer Reel features trailers of mixed qualities for One on Top of the Other, Schizoid aka A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin; Non si sevizia un paperino aka Don’t Torture a Duckling; I quattro dell’apocalisse aka Four of the Apocalypse; The Psychic; Zombie; Zombies 2 aka Zombie; Contraband; City of the Living Dead; The Black Cat; The Beyond; The House by the Cemetery; The New York Ripper; Manhattan Baby; Conquest; Rome, 2072AD: The New Gladiators; Murder Rock; The Devil’s Honey; Aenigma; Zombi 3; The House of Clocks; The Sweet House of Horrors; Un gatto nel cervello aka Nightmare Concert; Cat in the Brain aka Nightmare Concert; Voices from Beyond; and Fulci for Fake. Last is a set of Alternate Italian Opening Credits featuring the title Una lucertola con la pelle di donna, as an Italian and two English-language trailers for the film.
While this is a very encompassing set of extras, there’s plenty of material from previous releases that hasn’t been included. The 2016 Mondo Macabro Blu-ray features an audio commentary by Kit Gavin and Mondo Macabro’s Pete Tombs; Fulci: Day for Night, a 1994 interview with Fulci, and 2 US radio spots. The 2015 Le Chat qui Fume Blu-ray contains various interviews with Anita Strindberg, Jean Sorel, film critics Lionel Grenier, Jean-Francois Rauger, Olivier Pere, Alain Schlockoff, and filmmaker Christophe Gans; a featurette about the various versions of the film; an additional deleted scene not found anywhere else; the US opening and closing credits; the Hollywood Video French VHS version of the film; a photo gallery; and a CD soundtrack. And lastly, the 2007 Media Blasters/Shriek Show DVD features two separate interviews with Fulci scholar Professor Paolo Albieri.
Umbrella offers a very nice Blu-ray package for A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin. It can and should be available on 4K Ultra HD at some junction, but the film was released theatrically in so many varying versions that creating a definitive home video release would likely be a lengthy and expensive process. For now, this is a definitive release, with the hope that there are even better things to come. All in all, highly recommended.
- Tim Salmons
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