The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970)

Original title

L'uccello dalle piume di cristallo

Directed by

Dario Argento

Genre

drama film, horror film, crime film, slasher film, romance film, exploitation film

Country

Italy

Runtime

1h 41m

Rated

PG

Rating

7.1 of 10 from 838 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

An American writer in Rome witnesses a serial killer attacking a woman. He becomes obsessed with identifying the murderer before becoming a target himself.

suspensefulstylishtensemysteriousdarkeeriemethodicalunsettling

What happens

The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (Italian: L'uccello dalle piume di cristallo) is a 1970 giallo film written and directed by Dario Argento, in his directorial debut. It stars Tony Musante as an American writer in Rome who witnesses a serial killer targeting young women and tries to uncover the murderer's identity before he becomes their next victim. The cast also features Suzy Kendall, Enrico Maria Salerno, Eva Renzi, Umberto Raho and Mario Adorf. A co-production of Italy and West Germany, The Bird with the Crystal Plumage is the first in what has been called Argento's thematic "Animal Trilogy", along with his next two gialli, The Cat o' Nine Tails (1971) and Four Flies on Grey Velvet (1972). Argento's screenplay borrows liberally from Fredric Brown's 1949 novel The Screaming Mimi, which had previously been adapted into a 1958 American film. An international commercial and critical success on release, The Bird with the Crystal Plumage has been credited with popularizing giallo, an Italian genre of horror-thriller developed in the 1960s, and launched Argento's career as a filmmaker. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

More like this

• Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion (1970)
• Tenebrae (1982)
• Deep Red (1975)
• Le tue mani sul mio corpo (1970)
• Intimità proibita di una giovane sposa (1970)
• The Girl Who Knew Too Much (1963)
• Rider on the Rain (1970)
• Four Flies on Grey Velvet (1971)