Watch The Perfume of the Lady in Black For Free

Nice effects though.

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

A Masterpiece!

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

I really enjoyed this movie, despite the WTF ending. It's beautifully filmed, with an equally beautiful female protagonist. Her descent into madness is intriguing to watch. The afore mentioned weird ending does yield some patented Italian gore. It's relatively well paced, I only found myself bored a bit during the middle. But it really picks in the final act, with some slasher action. I recommend this classy mind trip.

For those who have seen more than one giallo on their watch, please save yourself the time. If you must know what the hub-bub is truly about, I will release spoilers later in the review.To get right to the underlying reason for watching these kinds of films, Mimsy gets naked twice: once briefly in a fairly rapid love making scene (where the camera likes to pan away) and at the very end with the "surprise" twistish ending. The murders don't really happen until the 1:20 mark, and there is no real gore to speak of until the very end, so be prepared for a very LONG wait for anything to happen.By the way, did I mention that this film is very dull? When I see words like "hypnotic" and "dreamlike" popping up when describing any film, they seem to be code for "drawn out" or "putting me to sleep".The plot goes something like this: Mimsy Farmer is a technician at a factory (either producing chemicals or beer, I couldn't tell which), who has frequent nightmares about her childhood and her mother (particularly how she died). In the course of this, she has a meeting with her boyfriend and some friends of his, some of whom appear to be dignitaries from Africa who converse about the dawning of science over witchcraft. As the story progresses, Mimsy's mental health starts to deteriorate as she begins to see a little girl who looks strangely like herself at the same age, as well as her mother in mirrors and the like. By the end of it, she is dressing like her mother and has gone quite mad, killing her boyfriend, the elderly scholar who resided beside her and her mother's former lover. It is revealed that Mimsy interrupted her mother having intercourse with the "lover" (or payee, if you know what I mean) and killed her own mother by pushing her out a window...thus, over time, the guilt (and maybe a little bit of shamanistic help from the aforementioned African dignitaries) pushed her over the edge quite literally.Yet, while one could consider this to be a proper ending for the main character, it is further revealed that the 3 people she killed are indeed still alive (which I am guessing the entire sequence was "in her head"), and they proceed to take her body to an underground tunnel, where everyone given any screen time in the movie participates in a cannibalistic ritual, with her boyfriend gutting her and the rest lining up to pull out a piece to eat.Now I can respect the visual aspect of the last shot, which (other than the Mimsy nudity) is the only saving grace of the film. Otherwise (as a friend put it tonight after finishing the film), "that's a pretty convoluted way to get your dinner".All in all, I was just too bored in the end to care about either twist, as I could see the "Mimsy dying the same way her mother did" ending the moment the method was revealed, and the cannibal ritual stuff was never dealt with very well to the degree that it felt tacked onto the main story.

"Il Profumo Della Signora In Nero" aka. "The Perfume Of The Lady In Black" (1974) is a film that enjoys a certain cult-status among my fellow fans of Italian Horror, and I was therefore curious to see it for quite some time. When I finally saw it recently, the film was not quite what I expected, but not in a negative sense, as it certainly didn't disappoint me. Having deliberately read no reviews before watching it, I was probably most surprised by the film since I had been mislead to believe that "The Perfume Of The Lady In Black" is a typical Giallo, whereas it is much rather an occult psychological Horror film. The fact that this beautifully filmed cult-gem is often named a Giallo is probably the stunning visual style, which reminds of many early 70s Gialli, such as some of the films by Sergio Martino, or Dario Argento's earlier work. The early films of Roman Polanski (especially "Repulsion" clearly served as an influence to this film. If there is one Giallo that "The Perfume Of The Lady In Black" is comparable to, it is probably Sergio Martino's "Tutti I Colori Del Buio" ("All The Colors Of The Dark", 1972), but the similarity also lies in the nightmarish atmosphere of upcoming insanity rather than in the Giallo-esquire elements (such as the typical depiction of murders, the mystery about the killer's identity etc.). One will not find a black-gloved killer butchering dozens of beauty-queens in "The Perfume Of The Lady In Black". What one will find, however, is cinematic beauty, genuine creepiness, a nightmarish atmosphere and utter insanity in equal doses in this bizarre, sometimes confusing, sometimes spine-chilling gem. The beautiful Mimsy Farmer stars as Silvya Hachermann, a chemist tormented by nightmarish visions related to her own childhood... I don't want do give too much of the storyline away, since it is unforeseeable and often bizarre, but I am sure it will appeal to most of my fellow Italian Horror fans. If the film has one weakness, it is that it is sometimes a bit too confusing, and does not always make perfect sense, but then, the film's obscure, sometimes surreal nature mostly makes up for this. Mimsy Farmer is once again wonderful in her role. Farmer is known to Italian Horror fans for her roles in films like "Macchie Solari" (aka. "Autospsy", 1975), Dario Argento's "Four Flies On Grea Velvet" (1971) and this one. Beautiful as she is, Farmer also has a great talent to play women on the cusp of mental instability, and she once again delivers an outstanding performance here. The other performances are all very good, especially memorable are Mario Scaccia as a friendly elderly neighbor, and Orazio Orlando as a truly sleazy scumbag. "Beautiful" is a word often used to describe this film, and for understandable reasons (at least as far as the visual style goes). This must be one of the most visually striking Italian Horror films of the early/mid 70s, and this is saying something as the combination of this genre, country and period bears countless films that are visually astounding. The photography is as impressive as the settings, and the many occult elements only make the film more effective. The score by Nicola Piovani is also great and contributes a lot to the film's creepy atmosphere. "The Perfume Of The Lady In Black" is a chilling and nightmarish film with an ascending atmosphere of insanity and a brilliant leading performance by Mimsy Farmer. Beautiful and terrifying in equal measures, this stylish and obscure cult-gem is highly recommended to all my fellow fans of Italian Horror.

Contains spoilers.Barilli, main character in Before the Revolution (B Bertolucci , 1964) , basically directed just another film after this one, plus one episode in a 1991 film ("La Domenica Specialmente") He is more of a painter ( you could not have missed the painting on the wall of Silvia's room in this Italian cult gem: Il Profumo Della Signora In Nero). Apart from highlighting the odd references 1. this film seems inspired by Polansky's "Rosemary Baby" 2. this film seems to have inspired Polansky's "Le Locataire" 3. Mimsy Farmer seems a name inspired by Mia Farrow (even if it can't be as Mia is only 18 days older than Mimsy!) and that I think that this film is quoted in Society( B Yuzna, 1989). I would say the last scene CAN be taking place in the real world. "Other" scene settings seemed strangely odd, because they ARE dreams. Note how the wall paper of the 'seance' is the same as the wrapping of a box with Silvia's friend's ashes. The latter is a DREAM. Which points to the last odd reference: Mulholland Dr : I think one can work out which scene is a dream and which not (as in David Linch's film). And there might be this thing where in the end Silvia (while dreaming ?) COMMITS SUICIDE. And the other thing that all the characters come back in the final sequence. Because it's the "real world"!!!! NO HAY BANDA What I could not explain though: why does Silvia keep dreaming of the Italian flag ?