In Italy the giallo refers to a genre of lurid crime paperbacks available at newsstands and bookstores, usually featuring garish cover art with women in peril and sinister assassins welding deadly weapons. Mario Bava is the director who captured the tone and style of this genre on screen and The Evil Eye (1963) is generally acknowledged as the first film giallo. Released in 1962 in Italy as La Ragazza Che Sapeva Troppo, the movie opens with an American tourist, Nora Davis (Leticia Roman), on her way to Rome for a vacation. After a disturbing incident at the airport - a fellow traveler on her flight is arrested for smuggling marijuana - Nora arrives at her aunt's house, only to discover that her relative is in very poor health. Ironically, Nora's aunt dies the very night of her arrival from a heart attack and sets in motion a terrible series of events. Nora, unable to reach the family doctor, flees her aunt's house and is promptly mugged and knocked unconscious by a purse snatcher. When she awakens on the deserted street, she witnesses a woman staggering toward her with a knife in her back. Things get progressively weirder from that point on with Nora eventually targeted as the next victim of the infamous "Alphabet Killer." Some vacation!

A beautifully photographed, consistently surprising suspense thriller, The Evil Eye plays like a cross between a Nancy Drew mystery and a violent film noir. Instead of pretty, postcard images of Rome, Bava focuses on the city's darker side, capturing its seedier back streets and an assortment of unsavory characters. Also, Bava's unsettling point of view shots, jarring sound effects (like a knife being pulled out of a dead body), and moody lighting perfectly convey Nora's paranoid state of mind as she slowly uncovers the killer's true identity. Yet, despite the gruesome events depicted in The Evil Eye, the film often displays a sense of fun which is readily apparent with the catchy pop song that opens the film and in some of the romantic encounters between Nora and the mysterious Dr. Bassi (John Saxon).

When La Ragazza Che Sapeva Troppo was picked up for distribution in the U.S., it was retitled The Evil Eye and subjected to several changes; the original Robert Nicolosi score was replaced with a music soundtrack by Les Baxter, the English-dubbed dialogue eliminated some important plot points, and scenes of pure comic relief were added to give the film a lighter tone. TCM is showing a letterboxed print of the Italian language version of the film with English subtitles. This version (the English translation of the Italian title is The Girl Who Knew Too Much) is also available on DVD from Image Entertainment. Anyone interested in the career of Mario Bava or the origins of the Italian giallo is urged to seek it out.

Director: Mario Bava
Screenplay: Mario Bava, Enzo Corbucci, Ennio De Concini, Eliana De Sabata, Mino Guerrini
Art Direction: Giorgio Giovannini
Cinematography: Mario Bava
Editing: Mario Serandrei
Music: Les Baxter, Robert Nicolosi, "Furore" by Adriano Celentano
Cast: Leticia Roman (Nora Davis), John Saxon (Dr. Marcello Bassi), Valentina Cortese (Laura Torrani), Robert Buchanan (Dr. Alessi), Gianni De Benedetto (Professor Torrani), Virginia Doro (Ethel Widnall), Dante DiPaolo (Andrea Landini).
C-100m. Letterboxed.