Sam Panico Do you need to love, trust and care about the hero of the movie? Mario Bava is here with Hatchet for the Honeymoon in an attempt to craft a story where the hero is the absolute worst person in the entire film.Meet John Harrington. He's 30, runs a bridal dress factory, lives in a gorgeous villa near Paris and kills young women to overcome his impotence and Oedipus complex. His wife, Mildred, refuses to divorce him. And he's instantly smitten with Helen (Dagmar Lassander, Forbidden Photos of a Lady Above Suspicion, House by the Cemetery), a young model who has come to replace a missing girl.Why is she missing? Well, take it from Alice. She was one of the models at the salon who John took a liking to, giving her one of his dresses for her wedding. The moment she tried it on, he hacked her up with a meat cleaver, burned her corpse and used it to fertilize the plants in his greenhouse.Inspector Russell knows that something isn't quite right. After all, how can six models disappear from the same dress company? If only there was some evidence.John, however, is falling in love with Helen. And he finally decides to do something about his wife. That something entails him putting on a wedding dress and killing her. But there's one problem. Here's where Bava twists the film from giallo into supernatural territory: she won't stay dead.While John can't see or hear his wife, everyone else can. Even after burning her remains and placing them in a handbag, she keeps coming back. He takes the handbag with him to a club, where an attempt to bring another woman home fails when she sees his wife. Beaten by a bouncer and ejected, he cannot even use his charms to win over women. He throws his wife's ashes into the night, but she remains with himIf John can't be happy, at least he can murder Helen. He convinces her to wear a wedding dress and tells her that he never wanted to hurt her. She avoids the final blow of his cleaver, which unlocks a flashback where we learned the truth: John loved his mother and that love grew as he became the man of the house after his father's death. But when she remarried - and started having sex again - he couldn't take it and murdered her and her new husband. His mind erased the evidence until now. Helen was an undercover cop all along, leading Inspector Russell and his men back to arrest John. While being transported to prison, he's happy knowing that his many trials are over. Then, to his horror, he sees the handbag and notices his wife sitting next to him. Now, he's the only person who can see her. She promised to be with him forever, even in Hell. He goes insane before accepting his fate.Hatchet for the Honeymoon predates the slasher, yet many of its conventions can be found here and in other early Bava works. This film is a masterwork of both style and substance, with gorgeous fashion, sets and camerawork creating a gorgeous tableau. I love the scene where John uses Bava's Black Sunday, playing on the TV, as an excuse for the screams that come from his apartment. And as his wife's blood drips down onto the ground floor, it's almost as if Bava dares you to empathize with a hero who is completely contemptable. What a predictament to be in!

wes-connors Exceptionally handsome fashion designer Stephen Forsyth (as Jonathan "John" Harrington) specializes in bridal gowns. He also has a compulsion to kill his beautiful models by slicing them with a meat cleaver. We know about the killing from the opening, as Mr. Forsyth's narration explains his proclivities. He may not know why, but it becomes fairly obvious. There is some unintentional confusion, however, in the casting of Guido Barlocci as Mr. Forsyth's character at a younger age; because they look nothing alike, you initially wonder what connection the blond boy has to Forsyth's psyche. The script in this Italian-made film is nothing special, but it's dubbed well, at times. Directed and photographed by Mario Bava, style is heightened over substance. The best scenes involve Forsyth and Mildred, his shrewish wife played by Laura Betti.Il rosso segno della follia (6/2/70) Mario Bava ~ Stephen Forsyth, Dagmar Lassander, Laura Betti, Jesus Puente

acidburn-10 Being a big fan of Giallo movies, I was pretty eager to see this one, well for the title alone, sounds like fun and when I finally got round to viewing this I was, well kind of disappointed and to be honest I found this movie kind of weird, even by the Italian slashers standard.Not to say that this movie is all bad, there were some parts that were quite interesting and fun. Here we have the lead character John who is hell bent on killing young brides to be in order to remember what happened to his own mother, which is an aspect that I found rather interesting as he played out rather well, but unfortunately the outcome was rather predictable. But his wife Mildred who is rather a miserable out hag who he hates and she takes every opportunity to put him in his place, I found her hilarious. But what was rather strange is that when he finally does kill her she begins to haunt him, where everyone can see her apart from him, which again a rather interesting plot point but totally off key and not what I expected. The deaths were really disappointing also as they were quite bloodless and off screen, and this movie does have pacing issues which tends to drag begin to lose interest halfway through.All in all I don't why it has been said that this movie is essential viewing in the Giallo era as, there are much better titles than this namely (Deep Red, Blood Bath and Bird With The Crystal Plumage). Not a terrible movie but not something worth viewing more than once.

cmoitze I was extremely surprised with the quality of this film. Mario Bava has created a flawless production. His use of colour is second to none. The sets and lighting are also top notch, conveying an eerie mood. Some lovely point of view shots are also utilized by Bava.This film tells the story of John Harrington, who runs a fashion house specialising in bridal wear. He is unhappily married to his overbearing wife Mildred and he is also insane.I would hesitate to call this a Giallo movie as the killer is revealed at the beginning of the film. This is more of a character study of the killer and his journey into madness.For those interested in thrillers and atmosphere this comes highly recommended. Far better than Bavas better known Bay of Blood, which i found rather cheap looking in comparison.This is a classic of Italian cinema. Highly recommended.