Eyeball (1975)

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Day 108 of Sobriety. 

Eyeball is a giallo by Umberto Lenzi, who is perhaps best known to horror fans for directing a couple of the better-known Italian cannibal films, including the notorious Cannibal Ferox (1981). His resume also includes a number of other well-regarded giallo and poliziotteschi (crime films). Not much in the way of straight-up horror, but he did direct 1988’s Ghosthouse (AKA La Casa), which I watched recently and wrote about on this blog.

The plot follows a group of American tourists who are traveling around Spain on a tour bus, and who start to get murdered one-by-one by an unknown killer whose trademark is gouging out one of the victim’s eyeballs.

I don’t know why I keep watching movies like this, but I do. Objectively speaking, pretty much every aspect of Eyeball is ridiculous. The characters that comprise the small tour group are all complete oddballs: a lesbian “photographer” and her model girlfriend, a bickering couple comprising a bitchy wife and lecherous husband, a two-timing company exec and his object-of-lust secretary...and so on. Not to mention the tour guide—a creepy weirdo who enjoys terrorizing the young girls in the party by planting rubber spiders and mice on them while cackling like an unhinged maniac.

And then there are the bumbling detectives who have been assigned to the case. Rather than halt the tour and investigate the crimes properly, they allow it to continue, provided the members of the group do not leave Barcelona. The tourists happily comply with this request and continue their sightseeing and partying, seemingly not too discouraged by their dwindling numbers.
 
I watched the English dub, as it didn’t seem to be any worse than the Italian dub, but pretty much everything that any of the characters say to each other is completely weird and unnatural. The plot follows the usual giallo format: twisty and confusing, with abundant red herrings and a final reveal that catapults the already decimated corpse of credibility into orbit.

But it does have those giallo qualities that we fans of the genre enjoy—nice photography and locations, attractive actors and actresses, cool period clothing, a slick, funky score, bloody, stylishly-shot murder set-pieces, and, yes, the aforementioned over-the-top absurd plot and characters would have to be in this list too.
 
Eyeball is certainly nowhere hear the pinnacle of the genre, but I guess it delivered the giallo goods.

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