Tonight on Channel 4Z, 8pm… 

THE BLACK CAT KILLS IN SEVEN ROOMS (Italy, 1973) 

aka L’ATTACCO DEL GATTO NERO ASSASSINO aka ESTE GATO SIGNIFICA ASESINATO  

A psychic medium (Bette Davis) enlists a reporter (Burgess Meredith) to solve the mystery of her own impending murder. Also starring Telly Savalas. Directed by Mario Bava. Score by Goblin. TV-MA for J&B drinking, prog-rock score, smoking.

This underseen supernaturally-tinged giallo from the maestro of the macabre Mario Bava (Blood and Black Lace, Bay of Blood) opens with a striking animated credits sequence centered on a cartoon version of Bette Davis’s character, the psychic medium Gunna Moralson, descending an endless spiral staircase, starkly rendered in black and yellow, as the credits text explodes in flashes of red from left to right across the screen and the opening title song by Goblin thumps and wails (sound way up, please!). It’s a stylish way to set the mood for the baffling madness that is to follow.

The film begins with what could be a POV shot as seen by a dog or some other low-to-the-ground animal running down a busy urban sidewalk, dodging pedestrians at knee-level until whatever we’re following reaches the stone base of a building, and then we are immediately treated to a breathtaking crane shot that pulls away from and then swings toward the tall building several times until our POV enters an open penthouse window where we confront Bette Davis as Gunna Moralson, clad in sequined capes and purple scarves and a silver tiara. She screams and says, “I knew it would be you!” and she collapses backward into a mountain of throw pillows.

And we cut to a bright candy-red yoyo rolling up and down its string and soon we see that the yoyo belongs to Telly Savalas as Police Detective Soavi who says, “We’ll you need to stay in town for a while, Brundelman.” He’s saying this to Burgess Meredith as Kingsley Brundelman. “And what the hell for?” Meredith wonders. Savalas replies, “You’re an American reporter in this city. We need you to solve these murders. We think it’s a serial killer at work.” We may be as baffled as Burgess Meredith when Savalas says, “That’s just how things work around here, Kundelson. Now get to work! The sooner you figure this out, the sooner we’ll let you leave Italy.”

This is the point—at barely three minutes into the movie—when everything onward refuses to make any logical sense. Also, one should be aware that this film’s English title makes not a bit of sense either. At no point in this film does a black cat even appear much less kill anyone in even a single room, to say nothing of seven. But you won’t care about any of that when the effervescent Burgess Meredith gets maniacally to work on the bizarre murder case. You may even find his performance of the character to be reminiscent of a roughly concurrent-in-time character: Karl Kolchak of the American TV movies The Night Stalker and The Night Strangler. Meredith, costumed in a canary yellow seersucker suit and a straw fedora, accosts and hassles random people on the streets of Rome until he encounters an art photographer (a cameo by Daria Nicolodi, wearing the largest sunglasses ever), who tells him that he needs to see Gunna Moralson, a famous psychic who has had visions of the serial killer. And she gives him Moralson’s business card: “Show this to the door man at the Accentua Tower. He’ll let you in.” Who knows why Daria Nicolodi even has this information? We’ll never find out, but Burgess Meredith isn’t worried about it. He takes the card and heads off to the high-rise apartment building that we saw at the top of the film.

Though Moralson’s apartment is insanely over-decorated and over-furnished, with bric-a-brac upon every surface and enough crystal balls and tarot decks to stock an occult supply shop, there still isn’t anywhere nearly enough available scenery in it—nor perhaps even in all of Italy—to be chewed by Davis and Meredith, two actors that threaten to utterly overwhelm the viewer when they end up in that apartment together. But their charm is hard to resist as Bette Davis lures Burgess Meredith into a session on a spirit board during which he sees a series of what look to be partially mummified corpses standing and sitting all over the apartment. It’s an eerie effect reminiscent of the climax of Bava’s earlier film Lisa and the Devil. Based on Bette Davis’s cryptic remarks, we are supposed to conclude that all these weird corpses are those of the serial killer’s victims…right? That’s not entirely clear, but Burgess Meredith theorizes that they can lay a trap for the killer by…eh, it’s not entirely clear either how his plan will work, but soon Telly Savalas is back in the movie doing…something to help with the plan?

I will refrain from spoiling the final act and the ending of this film because I want as many other viewers as possible to be as startled, stunned, horrified and delighted as I was with how this wild storyline concludes. You will want to jump out of your seat and applaud the great Mario Bava for crafting a final shot as brilliant as the final shot of Bay of Blood.  

Channel 4Z is airing Arrow Video’s recent 2K restoration of this nearly-forgotten title.