Page 187 - Alternative Europe Eurotrash and Exploitation Cinema Since 1945

QUALITY VS 'SLEAZE': DICHOTOMIES OF ITALIAN HORROR
Insofar as Il Boia Scarlatto {Bloody Pit of Horror, Massimo Pupillo, Italy/US, 1965) has a 'reputation',
it is largely confined to the ambivalent psychotronic gaze of trash aesthetes. It is seen as both a 'sick
piece of sixties schlock' and a 'masterpiece',2 'a great sleaze-trash classic',3' 'the apex of the seamy
streak that ran parallel with the greatest achievements of Italian horror',4 'a breathtaking blend of
cheesecake, pop art, and Sadean excess'.5 The film fares less well in those accounts that attempt to
measure its cinematic achievements. Cathal Tohill and Pete Tombs clearly like it, but find it 'too daft
to be described as bona fide sadism',6 while the Aurum Film Encyclopedia condemns it to being 'only
of interest as a case study to illustrate a theory of cinema-as-fantasy in psychoanalytical terms'.7 T i m
Lucas constructs a two-level hierarchy within 1960s Italian Horror; a 'quality' tradition of auteurs
like Mario Bava and Riccardo Freda, and 'sleaze-mongers ... mining torrid trash from the same raw
materials that their colleagues polished with individuality and pride'.8 It is not difficult to guess which
category Bloody Pit of Horror fits into.
One of the film's perceived absences, as Lucas' comment suggests, is an auteur figure, a mark
of distinction as significant in cult as canonical film discourses. Bloody Pit of Horror lacks either a
distinctive stylist like Mario Bava or even an efficient, and periodically inspired, journeyman like
Antonio Margheriti (aka 'Anthony M. Dawson'). Director Massimo Pupillo also directed the
Barbara Steele vehicle Cinque Tombe per un Medium {Terror Creatures from Beyond the Grave, Italy/
US, 1965). It is of limited significance that Pupillo used a pseudonym for both films, 'borrowing'
producer Ralph Zucker's name for Terror Creatures from Beyond the Grave and becoming 'Max
Hunter' for Bloody Pit of Horror; some of Bava's, Fredas and most of Margheriti's best films used
pseudonymous director credits. Commenting on his directorial credit (or lack thereof) on two 'cult
classics', Pupillo observed, 'I didn't give a fuck.' 9 More importantly, there is no sign of the stylistic
consistency craved by auteurists in Pupillo's two best-known films. Terror Creatures from Beyond
the Grave conforms to the atmospheric Gothic of other, more celebrated, Barbara Steele vehicles
directed by Bava, Freda and Margheriti; the Aurum Film Encyclopedia suggests that its stylishness
might be attributed to cameraman Carlo di Palma. 10 Terror Creatures from Beyond the Grave and
Bloody Pit of Horror also share the same writers, Roberto Natale and Romano Migliorini, who also
wrote Bava's extraordinary Operazione Paura {Kill, Baby, Kill!, Italy, 1966). Bloody Pit of Horror is
still the odd one out of the three, though, perhaps because it is more of a hybrid than the full-on
Gothic of the other two.

QUEER GOTHIC

Both Bloody Pit of Horrors detractors and fans seem agreed on two things. Firstly, if the film seems
to lack an 'auteur', its aesthetic centre can be found instead in the extraordinary, barnstorming
performance of former Mr Universe (and Hercules) Mickey Hargitay as the eponymous Boia Scarlatto
of the Italian title. Secondly, there seems to be something very queer going on in this particular Bloody
Pit. As Harry M. Benshoff argues, Gothic horror was 'tinged with a queer presence from its inception',
populated by Gothic villains whose sexuality in some way 'deviates from the standard heterosexualized

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