julia ross possessed fifth cord

Although known for its overabundance of style, the thriller genre probably allows for the least amount of creative wiggle room by a director. Audience expectations and plot requirements just don't leave much space for subtext or introspection. Hitchcock was one of the few to crack the code, which explains why most filmmakers blatantly followed his formula for success...with hit or miss results.

My Name is Julia Ross (1945) comes closer to the target than most. Directed by B-movie auteur Joseph H. Lewis (Gun Crazy), the film's white-knuckle plot involves a struggling working girl who takes a job as a personal secretary to a mysterious mother-son pair. But the next day she wakes up in an isolated seaside estate with new clothes and a new name. Her employers insist she is really Marion Hughes, wife of the mentally unbalanced man of the house, merely suffering from a nervous breakdown.

From that intriguing first act, the film rarely takes its foot off the gas, staging several aborted escape attempts as Julia tries to contact the outside world before she suffers the same fate as the original Mrs. Hughes. To his credit, Lewis doesn't allow his heroine to become a wallflower (like Joan Fontaine in the similar Rebecca), attempting to outwit her captors rather than wait for a rescue. While it doesn't quite stick the landing, there were enough twists, turns and oddball characters to convince Columbia to elevate this one to "A"-picture status and commission a pseudo-remake (Dead of Winter) in 1987.

Arrow Video's Blu-ray features a very nice hi-def image with commentary by noir expert Alan K. Rode, analysis by Nora Fiore (who ties the "loss of identity" theme in with post-WW2 females return to forced domesticity), theatrical trailer and illustrated collector's booklet.

Based on a true crime case, but much more experimental in execution, is The Possessed (1965), co-directed by Luigi Bazzoni and Franco Rossellini, and released as Lady of the Lake in its native Italy. There's a strong noir structure at the heart of it all, with a successful author returning to an off-season resort to find the object of his previous infatuation murdered under mysterious circumstances. His investigation winds up uncovering personal secrets about the close-knit community, and a surprising amount of his own psychological distress.

The screenplay (co-written by Italian oddball Giulio Questi) proceeds in a deceptively straightforward fashion...until it doesn't. With fever dreams, flashbacks and premonitions, the audience is kept continually off-balance by the film's hallucinogenic approach. It's a fascinating combination of giallo conventions and art-film aesthetic, popping with overexposed visions and foggy memories. If Bergman and Godard made a thriller, The Possessed might very well have been the result!

Arrow's Blu-ray, transferred from a new 2K restoration, handles the quirky visual approach exceedingly well and also includes a spot-on Tim Lucas commentary, video appreciation, interviews, trailers and illustrated collector's booklet with new writing on the film.

Bazzoni is back, this time in collaboration with cinematographer Vittorio Storaro (Bird with the Crystal Plumage, Apocalypse Now) and actor Franco Nero (Django) for one of the most stunning photographed giallos ever made: The Fifth Cord (1971). A reunion of sorts - the trio had previously worked on a series of Italian documentaries and shorts - their fluency with one another shows as the film turns a rather ordinary killer-on-the-loose plot into a series of set-piece stalkings set against eye-catching modern Italian landmarks and architecture. Nero gets to play both victim and suspect as an alcoholic journalist who must solve the mysterious murders before ending up in jail...or ending up dead.

Certainly not one of Vittorio Storaro’s better known films, it's just as visually striking as his best work, slicing the screen with harsh key lights and clever compositions that stand apart from any gialli before or since. While foregoing any excessive gore or nudity, Bazzoni ups the ante on Argento by applying both a fabulous visual style and a story that makes sense. The Fifth Cord feels like a movie made for grown-ups set in a world of cold, lonely modernity. There are not many characters to like but it all looks so lovely, fans of the genre aren't likely to mind.

Arrow Video's new 2k restoration comes from the original camera negative and looks simply awesome (the previous Blue Underground DVD wasn't half-bad either). The hi-def image is well worth an upgrade and includes a commentary track, video essay, interviews, deleted montage sequence, image gallery, trailers and illustrated collector's booklet.