Coventry Director Arne Mattsson is most famous for his 1958 thriller "Mannequin in Red" which allegedly was a role-model movie for the giallo that emerged from Italy during the sixties. Being a gigantic fan of gialli, I really wanted to watch "Mannequin in Red" but – alas – I only found this "Mask of Murder" instead. The first thing that becomes quite obvious here is that Mattsson was quite a lazy and patriotic Swede… The events are supposed to take place in a winterly Canadian village, but everyone drives around in Volvo cars with Swedish license places and I'm pretty sure I also spotted a couple of Swedish signposts as well. The only thing missing to make it abundantly clear that filming took place in Sweden is an Ikea warehouse in the background or guest appearances from the ABBA band members! Secondly, I presume this movie is supposed to be a whodunit/mystery thriller, yet the identity of the killer as well as his motivations are pretty obvious straight from the first murder, so all that remains is a goofy giallo-lite flick with the almighty Christopher Lee in yet another inferior supportive role. The police are hunting down a misogynist and masked killer who slices the throats of his female victims with a razor. He's a dumb killer, I may add, because he allows himself to get caught rather easily. During the arrest, Lt. Bob McLaine shoots the suspect much against the will of his superior Chief Lt. Jonathan Rich (Lee) who also gets injured during the conflict. By the way, did you know the Canadian police use machine guns?!? A few days later, Lt. McLaine painfully discovers that his wife Maria lies about going on holiday to Bermuda in order to spend time with her lover – and her husband's colleague – Ray Cooper. Poor Bob emotionally cracks and at the same time the misogynous killer with his hideous mask and razor starts murdering again. Oh gee, I wonder who he is! The regretful thing about "Mask of Murder" is that plot and the denouement hold quite a lot of potential, so in case Arne Mattsson and his crew would have bothered to uphold the mystery and create suspense just a little bit more, this honestly could have been a nice 80s horror sleeper. Now "Mask of Murder" mainly comes across as a lazy effort. Even the killer's mask is an uninspired and ugly piece of scenery in spite of its significant role in the plot. Was it that hard to come up with a slightly more creative mask?

Nicholas Dubreuil I'll be totally honest with you: No, it's not the best film in the World. Yes the music score is really annoying. Yes the whole visual aspect is pretty colorless and dull, not to mention the badly made gore sequences. But for my part, I liked seeing the trio of actors (Taylor/Perrine/Lee) make their best and save it from being a total mess. Which is quite remarkable considering the poor premise of this would-be slasher movie. Sure it's not a great thriller, but it's still a decent time-passing show. I also liked its flaws amazingly enough: it's SO MUCH an 80s film, you could swear going back in time just by viewing it. Watch it for the actors if anything.

Luisito Joaquin Gonzalez (LuisitoJoaquinGonzalez) Mask of Murder is another of those mystery thrillers that borrows plot points from the slasher movies and giallos that had been popular around the time. Just like Baby Doll Murders, Out of the Dark and Dead End; Mask of Murder puts a mysterious killer up against a struggling and scarily inept Police Force. Christopher Lee's credits over the last ten years have included three mega-blockbusters, which isn't bad going for an actor that made his first movie appearance way back in the midst of World War 2. He was initially John Carpenter's first choice to play the Sam Loomis character in Halloween, but he didn't accept; something he admits he's always regretted. He even went as far as to call it the biggest mistake of his career. Obviously annoyed that he'd missed out on some supreme slasher action, perhaps the reason he took a supporting role here was because he didn't want to make the same mistake twice? Or maybe he was blackmailed into doing it? I really don't know, but one thing is certain however, he was definitely slumming it here…It's all set in a small snowy Canadian town. Almost immediately, a loony in a mask grabs an unsuspecting woman and slices her throat with a straight razor. Later that day in another location, a second victim suffers the same fate at the hands of the gruesome killer. He removes his disguise and heads back to a remote cabin where he proves his dementia by gnashing his teeth and staring into the screen. Ooooh scary! We next get to meet the members of our cast over dinner. First off there's John (Christopher Lee) the chief of the local Police Force. His best detective, Bob (Rod Taylor) has been having problems with his wife Marianne (Valerie Perrine). These difficulties must have a lot to do with the fact that his partner Ray (Sam Cook) is busy banging her every time that he gets the chance. The dinner party is cut short when Bob receives a call informing him that they have the assassin surrounded. They rush to the scene and to cut a long story short, the city of Nelson should be a little quieter from now on. But the tranquillity doesn't last. It begins to look like there's a copycat murderer at work when more women turn up with their throats slit. Is someone mimicking the murders? Or is the killer back from beyond the grave? Why on earth Christopher Lee turned down Halloween but chose to play a part in this turkey is one of the world's biggest mysteries. I mean seriously come on, surely the screenwriter must have known that the killer's identity was patently obvious from the start. This is perhaps the dumbest and most basic premise for a murder mystery that I have ever seen. The Scooby Doo cartoon offers less obvious plot twists than this rubbish. Swedish film-maker Arne Mattson directs so sloppily that he manages to drag surprisingly wooden performances from an inviting ensemble of screen veterans. Lee's the best of the bunch, but he's not on screen long enough to warrant his fans to hunt this down. The pace is non-existent, and perhaps the most obnoxious thing about Mask of Murder is the horrible music that accompanies every 'twist' in the story. It sounds like a one-handed guitarist attempting to mimic a Jimi Hendrix lick after one too many bottles of cider.The throat slashings are quite bloody and in one scene a girl is murdered in a cinema - a trick that has become a slasher trademark after He knows you're alone and Scream 2. The only problem is that the killings are so poorly executed that the gratuitous blood gushes just look like a poor attempt to flog a dead horse. I knew from the off that I was in for a bad time with this movie and my suspicions were confirmed when I witnessed Rod Taylor sniffing his adulterous wife's underwear. (Don't ask!)I'm led to believe that Mask of Murder has become extremely rare, which is certainly a blessing. If you want to keep your sanity intact then please don't bother trying to hunt this one down. If you must buy this waste of space for the inclusion of Christopher Lee, then all I can recommend is don't get the UK version. The BBFC rated print is missing all the throat slashing, which makes it even less rewarding. This is an exceptionally bad film, riddled with uninspired hamstrung performances and dumb pathetic scripting. Shame on you Mr. Lee...

zeppo-2 While I agree with nearly all of what chrisie says in her review here, I don't think it's one of the worst films I've ever seen. But maybe that says something more about me than it does the film...There was a plot here, not much of one but lot of grade-Z films don't have that subtle little thing. Plus there was a kinda twisted motive for the copycat killer that made some logical sense. Again, not a feature of some bad films I've seen.The acting was pretty standard and Chris Lee could have phoned his role in, Rod Taylor played his usual 'tough straight guy' part and Valerie Perrine was...er...Valerie Perrine again...nice eye candy but little else.Main fault really is this type of film had been done many times before and done far better. Still, it passed the time and I resisted the urge to fast-forward, which is always a good sign.And by the way, I don't think it was his wife's knickers that Rod Taylor was sniffing, looked more like her nightie to me. Not that most men would blame him for having a sniff of the knicks....we're strange, complicated creatures we men! In this instance I assume the idea that he was smelling his wife's perfume on her nightie to show the viewers this was the only way he could get close to her anymore? Then again, maybe he's just a pervert.....N.B. My referring to another review by Chrisie in which she mentions the knicker sniffing may be confusing since that review has been deleted for some unknown reason.