I know that's Academy Award winner Adrien Brody there, and I know you're thinking just how alternative can this be. But the Italian giallo (yellow) is a mainly forgotten genre, despite it's influence in many a mainstream project, and despite it's occasional resurrection it is very rarely mentioned outside of genre publications. From the off Giallo (yellow) is not a good film, but it allows me to discuss the latter day work of auteur Dario Argento whose past few projects have failed incredibly to match up to the standards set by Suspiria, Profondo Rosso and Tenebrae (Dario it would appear has caught SWS: Stevie Wonder Syndrome ). Giallo (yellow) looks flat compared to his previously flashy work, it looks like a cheap television film. The few glimpses of violence and action are shot in a surprisingly unimpressive manner for a director known for his flair for poetic violence! The film's plot about a world weary detective tracking down a YELLOW skinned killer is hackneyed to the point of being ridiculous and there are no real surprises, even the identity of the performer behind the killer is blatantly obvious. The main problem here is Brody, his performance as the detective borders on the comatose, with a throaty voice that somehow makes certain words disappear before you can understand them, this laconic attitude seems to actually rub off on the film and where there should be a sense of urgency there is only Brody, smoking a cigarette and watching the day go by, this is a major problem for a thriller! Argento is (or based on this evidence; was) a talented director, but his interest here seems severely lacking, it's a shame because parts of it are entertaining, just all for the wrong reasons.
*just in case you didn't know Giallo is Italian for Yellow, also the name for a series of spectacularly trashy, wonderfully playful thrillers in the seventies and eighties.
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