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Your Vice Is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key

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Your Vice Is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key
Theatrical release poster
ItalianIl tuo vizio è una stanza chiusa e solo io ne ho la chiave
Directed bySergio Martino
Screenplay byErnesto Gastaldi
Adriano Bolzoni
Sauro Scavolini
Story byLuciano Martino
Sauro Scavolini
Based on"The Black Cat"
by Edgar Allan Poe
Produced byLuciano Martino
StarringEdwige Fenech
Anita Strindberg
Luigi Pistilli
Ivan Rassimov
Franco Nebbia
Riccardo Salvino
CinematographyGiancarlo Ferrando
Edited byAttilio Vincioni
Music byBruno Nicolai
Production
company
Lea Film
Distributed byTitanus
Release date
  • 4 August 1972 (1972-08-04) (Italy)
Running time
96 minutes
CountryItaly
LanguageItalian

Your Vice Is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key (Italian: Il tuo vizio è una stanza chiusa e solo io ne ho la chiave) is a 1972 Italian giallo film directed by Sergio Martino and starring Edwige Fenech, Luigi Pistilli, and Anita Strindberg. The film revolves around a depraved writer and his mistreated wife, whose fragile relationship is further complicated by local murders and the arrival of the writer's beautiful niece.

The film was Martino's fourth giallo and loosely adapts elements from Edgar Allan Poe's 1843 short story "The Black Cat".[1] Its title derives from Martino's earlier The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh,[2] in which the titular character (played by Fenech) receives a note containing a similar phrase. The film has been released under several alternative titles, including Gently Before She Dies, Eye of the Black Cat, and Excite Me.[citation needed]

Plot

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Oliviero Rouvigny, a washed-up, alcoholic writer, lives in an old villa in Teolo, where he abuses his wife Irina and their maid Brenda and hosts debauched parties for local hippies. Irina lives in fear of her husband and his cat Satan, who belonged to Oliviero’s late mother Esther, a former actress. Oliviero is protective of the cat and his mother's special dress that she wore to portray Mary Stuart.

After his mistress Fausta is found murdered, Oliviero is questioned by Inspector Farla after being identified by Fausta's boss Bartello. Oliviero claims that he was at home, and Irina reluctantly supports his lie. That night, Brenda puts on Esther's dress, unknowingly watched by a drunk Oliviero. Brenda is attacked by someone with a billhook and dies as Irina discovers her. Fearful after being suspected for Fausta's death, Oliviero walls up Brenda's body in the cellar and orders Irina to clean his mother's gown.

The next day, the Rouvignys collect Oliviero's visiting niece Floriana at a nearby train station, unknowingly watched by mysterious gray-haired man. That night, the gray-haired man delivers Esther's dry-cleaned gown to Irina, whose indiscretion enrages Oliviero, prompting him to lock Irina in a closet to be clawed by Satan. Floriana teases her uncle Oliviero for his attraction to her and alludes to a rumor that he had an incestuous affair with his mother Esther. She later finds Irina in the closet and frees her. Irina confides in Floriana about Oliviero's abuse and cover-up, and the two have sex.

The killer murders prostitute Giovanna, whose madame kills the attacker, revealed to be Bartello, who escaped a psychiatric hospital and faked a new identity. Floriana begins dating motorbike racer Dario. After being forced to drop out of a race, Dario has sex with Floriana in an abandoned loft, where Oliviero spies on them. At the villa, local junk dealer Mrs. Molinar witnesses Irina stabbing one of Satan's eyes out with scissors after he kills several of Irina's pet doves.

That night, Oliviero discovers Floriana in his mother's gown. She reveals she knew that her uncle spied on her and Dario's tryst, and the two have sex. Floriana later informs an unsurprised Irina about the encounter and Oliviero's burgeoning desire to murder Irina, then implies that Irina should preemptively kill Oliviero and make it look like an accident. Irina eavesdrops on Floriana's and Oliviero's pillow talk, overhearing Oliviero's proposition to murder Irina and hide her body in the cellar. Oliviero finds and beats her. Dario secretly invites Floriana to meet him in the morning to watch him race for a lucrative contract. Irina chases Satan into the cellar, where she discovers that Brenda's corpse has been uncovered, convincing her that Oliviero is serious about his plan.

Irina eventually kills Oliviero at his desk with scissors. Floriana reveals that she covets Esther's valuable jewelry, which Irina gives her after she helps hide Oliviero's body in the cellar. The two have sex. A figure enters the villa and repeatedly types "vendetta" on Oliviero's typewriter. Floriana flees the villa. The figure is revealed to be the gray-haired man, Walter, who is Irina's secret lover and accomplice in her plot to torment and destroy her husband. Irina killed Esther and had Walter kill Brenda to cast police suspicion on Oliviero and cause him to wonder whether he killed Brenda in a rage and drank to blackout.

The next day, Walter creates an oil spill that causes Dario and Floriana to die in a motorcycle accident. He retrieves Esther's jewelry and returns it to Irina, who pushes him off a cliff to his death. Irina returns to the villa, where she is approached by Inspector Farla and a police officer, who are investigating Mrs. Molinar's report that Irina maimed Satan. They hear Satan's meowing in the villa. They trace the sounds to the cellar, where they discover Satan walled off beside Oliviero's body, to Irina's horror.

Cast

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References

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  1. ^ "Your Vice Is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key". DVD Times. Retrieved 7 March 2007. [dead link]
  2. ^ "The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh". Eccentric Cinema. Retrieved 7 March 2007. [dead link]
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