Giallo Essentials - Red Edition

Alongside the spaghetti western, the giallo is one of the most famous Italian export genres: films steeped in mystery and intrigue, delivered with stylised violence and unforgettable musical themes.

The Possessed (1965) masterfully combines noir, mystery and giallo tropes in a proto-giallo based on one of Italy's most notorious crimes. It tells the story of a depressed novelist (Peter Baldwin) in search of his old flame (Virna Lisi) who has disappeared under suspicious circumstances, prompting an investigation that finds him plunged into a disturbing drama of familial secrets, perversion, madness and murder. The Fifth Cord (1971) boasts a complex, Agatha Christie-esque plot of investigation into a series of brutal assaults. As the body count rises, whisky swilling journalist Andrea Bild (Franco Nero) finds himself under suspicion, making it all the more imperative he crack the case. The Pyjama Girl Case (1978), inspired by a real-life case that baffles to this day, takes us to Australia where former inspector Timpson comes out of retirement to crack the case of a young woman, found on the beach, shot in the head, burned to hide her identity and dressed in distinctive yellow pyjamas...

In the first of a multi-volume series of Giallo Essentials these films feature a raft of talent in front and behind the camera with each film restored from the original camera negative and presented with a range of contextualising interviews and featurettes.

Special Edition Features

• Brand new 2K restorations of the film from the original camera negative for The Possessed, The Fifth Cord and The Pyjama Girl Case
• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentations of each film
• Original lossless mono Italian and English soundtracks
• Newly translated English subtitles for the Italian soundtracks
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing for the English soundtracks
• Rigid box packaging with newly designed artwork by Adam Rabalais in a windowed Giallo Essentials Collection slipcover

The Possessed:

• New audio commentary by writer and critic Tim Lucas
• Richard Dyer on The Possessed, a newly filmed video appreciation by the cultural critic and academic
• Cat’s Eyes, an interview with the film's makeup artist Giannetto De Rossi
• Two Days a Week, an interview with the film's award-winning assistant art director Dante Ferretti
• The Legacy of the Bazzoni Brothers, an interview with actor/director Francesco Barilli, a close friend of Luigi and Camillo Bazzoni
• Original trailers
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Sean Phillips

The Fifth Cord:

• New audio commentary by critic Travis Crawford
• Lines and Shadows, a new video essay on the film’s use of architecture and space by critic Rachael Nisbet
• Whisky Giallore, a new video interview with author and critic Michael Mackenzie
• Black Day for Nero, a new video interview with actor Franco Nero
• The Rhythm Section, a new video interview with film editor Eugenio Alabiso
• Rare, previously unseen deleted sequence, restored from the original negative
• Original Italian and English theatrical trailers
• Image gallery
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Haunt Love

The Pyjama Girl Case:

• New audio commentary by Troy Howarth, author of So Deadly, So Perverse: 50 Years of Italian Giallo Films
• New video interview with author and critic Michael Mackenzie on the internationalism of the giallo
• New video interview with actor Howard Ross
• New video interview with editor Alberto Tagliavia
• Archival interview with composer Riz Ortolani
• Image gallery
• Italian theatrical trailer
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Chris Malbo