A "psychosexual maniac" is stalking the students of an Italian university.
First Florence and her boyfriend are murdered after encountering a peeping tom in a lover's lane.
Next, Carol leaves a party in a marijuana haze after giving a couple of her fellow students the brush off. They pursue her on their motorbikes but prove to be all mouth and little action after one crashes and lands in the mud. It's too late for Carol, however, who flees ever deeper in the woods and runs into the killer, who strangles her.
This time at least the police have a clue. The killer used a distinctive red and black patterned scarf.
Another student, Daniela (Tina Aumont) receives a threatening call, indicating that to tell the police about the red scarf – which flashbacks reveal she saw around the neck of a fellow student, whom we have already seen assaulting a prostitute he picked up – would be a bad idea.
The police go to question the stall owner who sells the scarves. No friend of the police, he is evasive and attempts to blackmail the killer, but only succeeds in getting himself run down for his troubles.
Seeking to get away from the unpleasantness Daniela and her friends, Ursula, Katia (Carla Brait – The Case of the Bloody Iris ) and Jane (Suzy Kendall – The Bird with the Crystal Plumage ) decide to spend some time at a hilltop villa outside of town.
It's a nice idea but, unfortunately, the killer is on their trail…
Although low on the originality front, Torso AKA The Bodies Bear Traces of Carnal Violence is a stylish and effective giallo, with a solid script and assured direction from reliable professional guns Sergio Martino ( Mountain of the Cannibal God , Mannaja: A Man Called Blade ) and Ernesto Gastaldi ( The Whip and the Body , The Case of the Bloody Iris )
The suspenseful sequences, most notably the showdown between "final girl" Kendall and the killer, when for a time neither is 100 per cent sure of the other's presence in the villa, are stand outs.
As a mystery the film is perhaps less successful. Though there are plenty of suspects and red herrings on offer, generic expectations work against them: Anyone who has seen more than a couple of gialli will know that it's usually a safe bet to assume that anyone presented as a prime suspect won't be the perpetrator.
Perhaps needless to say, the comedy elements are the film's weakest point, the failure of many such moments to work outwith their native context (if at all) being signalled by the fact that they were by and large omitted from the original international release of the film.
But such criticisms are not enough to overcome the overall effectiveness of the film, which is worth viewing not only by giallo fans but also for fans of the American slasher film on which it would seem to have exerted some influence.
Anchor Bay's Region One DVD of Torso presents the film in its original 1.85:1 aspect ratio, enhanced for 16:9 televisions. The transfer is a good one, with good definition and little in the way of dirt, grain or artefacting. The mono Dolby Digital audio is adequate if unspectacular, with a choice of English and Italian dubs and optional English subtitles. These come in handy for the non-Italian speaker during the restored scenes, absent from the international release of the film, which are presented with Italian audio.
The disc is fairly light on extras, with only the US and international trailers on offer. A Sergio Martino interview segment or the ability to compare the version presented here with the international cut (something Anchor Bay did with their release of the less-heralded giallo Delirium ) would have been very welcome.
Copyright © K H Brown 2002-2005
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