TheFifthCord

The Fifth Cord (1971)

Italian badass Franco Nero stars in this Giallo as a reporter on the trail of a killer. The killer is committing his crimes and then leaves a glove, missing a finger for each crime committed at the scene as his calling card. After each crime Andrea (Nero’s character) seems to be that much closer to solving the crime. But all of the victims seem to be related to him in some way, so he quickly makes his way to the top of the list of suspects. Can Andrea figure out who the killer is before he strikes too close to home?

This is a difficult review for me to write. The Fifth Cord has all the makings of a great Giallo, but somehow just didn’t do it for me. The story is there with all the possible suspects and red herrings tossed in. The identity of the killer is kept until the end and when revealed is plausible and makes total sense. I also dug what appeared to be random calls to Andrea to back off, but eventually make sense given what he begins to uncover. But I just found myself having a hard time getting into the movie. First in spite of a decent story I found the pacing to be a bit too slow for my liking, even for a Giallo. You have long stretches with Nero’s Andrea character sulking and chewing up the scenery. Which brings me to another problem that I had with the movie. The lead character of Andrea is a drunk and just not a nice guy. Toss in a typical Nero performance, which is surly and brooding, and I just didn’t like the Andrea character at all. Personally I’ve always found myself enjoying the Giallos that make the lead character someone to root for. Andrea is a real bastard, which made the movie less fun for me to watch and stay interested in.

The attacks are well staged, but are actually very tame in comparison to most of the other Giallos that I’ve watched. In fact the best parts to the attacks aren’t even related to the gore. The 1st attack seems to be much more brutal by the hollow ringing sound that the metal pipe used makes as it bangs again and again on the head of the victim! That is probably the most memorable bit from the film. I was also impressed by a really good jump scare from the 2nd attack. The movie also boasts a groovy soundtrack that jumps out at you right from the start and helps to set a nifty 70s Euro trash vibe that I always dig with these movies. One thing that did sort of bug me about the movie from a technical standpoint are the volume of day for night shots. They don’t really work and just come off as being shot with a weird blue filter or gel over the camera lens. I was really surprised by this because the rest of the movie boasts some really good camera work.

The DVD that I’m reviewing is the Blue Underground release. It has a killer special feature called Black Days that contains interviews with star Franco Nero and cinema photographer Vittorio Storaro. They talk about getting into the movie business together, how they ended up working on The Fifth Cord, and what working with some of the cast and crew were like. This isn’t so much as informative about the Fifth Cord as it is about their careers and the Italian movie business in general. I really liked it and even at only 16 minutes long found Black Days to be well worth checking out and very informative.

All in all the Fifth Cord is a by the numbers Giallo that in my opinion is an average movie. Still if you are a fan of the genre or if you dig Franco Nero you might want to pick this one up for the collection. I’m glad to have taken the time to check it out myself, though I’m not sure if or when I’ll ever revisit it.

2 ½ out of 4

reviewed by John Shatzer