Mimsy Farmer’s fragile mind splinters yet again during a hot Roman summer in Francesco Barilli’s THE PERFUME OF THE LADY IN BLACK, on DVD from Raro Video/Entertainment One.

Sylvia Hacherman (Mimsy Farmer, FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET) is a young, workaholic chemist living alone amongst a handful of eccentric neighbors in an old apartment building in Rome (viewers may recognize the impressive exterior façade as the library of philosophy in Dario Argento’s INFERNO). When she attends a party with her geologist boyfriend Roberto (Maurizio Bonuglia, TOP SENSATION/THE SEDUCERS) for university associate Andy (Jho Jenkins, SHAFT IN AFRICA), Sylvia is unsettled when the conversation turns towards black magic and human sacrifice. Not particularly stable to start with, Sylvia starts to tip over the edge when she pricks her finger on an inexplicably-placed nail during a tennis game. Left alone when Roberto goes on a trip to South Africa, Sylvia starts to suffer from very realistic hallucinations involving her dead mother (Renata Zamengo, STREET LAW) and her lover. Her only friend seems to be paternal neighbor Signor Rossetti (Mario Scaccia, WE STILL KILL THE OLD WAY), a retired professor with a fascination for photographing hippopotami. Her neighbor Francesca (Donna Jordan) drags her up to her apartment for a visit with Orchidea (Nike Arrighi, Truffaut’s DAY FOR NIGHT), a blind psychic who recounts the drowning death of Sylvia’s sailor father and the mysterious death of her mother. Later, a mysterious little girl (Lara Wendel, TENEBRE) invades her apartment and presents her with a music box from her own childhood. The next morning, she discovers that Francesca has mysteriously died. When Sylvia discovers that her mother’s lover Nicola (Orazio Orlando, POLICEWOMAN) has been stalking her, she retreats farther into isolation. The little girl, obviously a younger version of herself, convinces her that everyone is out to get her (which may be true, since throughout the film there's suspicious interactions between Sylvia’s friends, colleagues, and various strangers she has encountered). Sylvia believes the answer may lie somewhere in her traumatic past, but the truth may be far more sinister.

Having nothing to do with the plot of the Gaston Leroux novel (adapted most recently in France in 2005 by Bruno Podalydès) from which it derives its title, THE PERFUME OF A LADY IN BLACK is a late riff on Roman Polanski’s adaptation of ROSEMARY’S BABY (although Polanski himself would borrow from his work for his 1976 film of Roland Topor’s THE TENANT) with things taking a REPULSION-like turn late in the film, before returning to the former with a more graphic climax. Having already played father-obsessed neurotics in Argento’s FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET and Armando Crispino’s AUTOPSY, Farmer was the perfect choice as the film’s paranoid and superstitious heroine. Although she started out as an AIP contract player in the 1960s, Farmer found much of her success abroad starting with Barbet Schroeder’s MORE and George Lautner's ROAD TO SALINA. She continued working in Italian and French television, as well as a handful of roles in some lesser-known French and Italian films (including Marco Ferreri’s BYE BYE MONKEY and DEEP RED actor Gabriele Lavia’s SENSI). She returned to the Italian horror genre with Lucio Fulci’s THE BLACK CAT and Ruggero Deodato's derivative but slick BODYCOUNT. Her last acting credit was in Roger Vadim’s TV movie SAFARI in 1991. Farmer, who now works as a movie art department sculptor with her husband Francis Poirier, was recently interviewed in an issue of Video Watchdog. She recalled liking the script but not the final product (Barilli corroborates her reaction back in the DVD interview).

Bonuglia has little to do here but look sinister (his boyfriend character was a producer-mandated addition), but his perverse good looks had previously been put to good use in other Eurocult fare such as a wealthy widow’s boytoy (who also brought along Edwige Fenech and Rosalba Neri) in THE SEDUCERS and as a promiscuous priest in THE WEAPON, THE HOUR, THE MOTIVE. Arrighi – who had previously been worried by cultists in Hammer’s THE DEVIL RIDES OUT – is also more of a presence than a performer here. Wendel – billed here under her real name, Daniela Barnes – gets to play a talkative variation on the Italian ghost girl in a white dress. The German-born daughter of American western actor Walter Barnes (HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER), she went on to some risqué adolescent roles in RING OF DARKNESS and MALADOLESCENZA (with an equally underage Eva Ionesco) before playing the teenage victim of an extended murder set-piece in Argento’s TENEBRE. Her Eurocult resume also included lead roles in the Filmirage pics GHOSTHOUSE and KILLING BIRDS. Eurocult viewers may recognize Scaccia – who died this year – as the faith healer who gets choked by Carla Gravina’s floating disembodied hand in Alberto De Martino’s THE ANTICHRIST/THE TEMPTER. The American-born Jordan’s only other film credit was the Paul Morrissey/Andy Warhol collaboration L’AMOUR. Musician Jenkins got his start in SHAFT IN AFRICA before heading to Rome for the Steve Carver/Joe D’Amato New World Pictures’ flic THE ARENA. The rest of his filmography comprised a handful of Italian exploitation appearances including Cesare Canevari’s must-see THE NUDE PRINCESS (with Ajita Wilson) and Guiliano Petrelli’s EYE BEHIND THE WALL (with John Phillip Law). Zamengo might be recognizable to Italian horror viewers from Argento’s SUSPIRIA as the second victim in the film’s opening murder set-piece. Ubiquitous Italian exploitation bit-part player Carla Mancini (BIRD WITH THE CRYSTAL PLUMAGE, BABA YAGA) pops up – with dialogue – as one of Sylvia’s colleagues. Margherita Horowitz, another Eurocult bit player with small roles in SUSPIRIA and DEATH LAID AN EGG among others, plays one of Sylvia’s eccentric neighbors.

Francesco Barilli had begun his career on documentaries before assistant director stints on Pasolini’s THE HAWKS AND THE SPARROWS (uncredited) and Camillo Bazzoni’s A LONG RIDE FROM HELL. His only two feature works were this film and the equally disturbing PENSIONE PAURA, which is available on Italian-only DVD. The rest of his career was divided in between directing documentaries and TV miniseries and a handful of acting roles. Barilli and co-scenarist Massimo D’Avak (who scripted Lenzi’s SO SWEET, SO PERVERSE and MAN FROM DEEP RIVER) had previously collaborated on the script for Aldo Lado’s WHO SAW HER DIE? Barilli later collaborated with Lucio Fulci on the scenario of Giuseppe Petroni Griffi’s erotic thriller LA GABBIA (1985) with Tony Musante, Florinda Bolkan, and Laura Antonelli. It is unfortunate that he did not continue in the genre, since PERFUME and PENSIONE PAURA are more successful at balancing the graphic and the subtle than other late mid-to-late 1970s Italian horror films. The score by Nicola Piovani (FLAVIA THE HERETIC) – who won an Oscar for LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL – recalls Krzysztof Komeda’s score for the Polanski film by weaving a chilling lullaby throughout the score in various orchestrations. Mario Masini shot a number of films for Carmelo Bene, and his cinematography here favors more naturalistic lighting (other than some warm gels) in contrast with the bolder colors of the eclectic production and costume design. Producer Giovanni Bertolucci’s resume moved between back and forth between art and exploitation, from cousin Bernardo Bertolucci’s early pictures, to Visconti’s CONVERSATION PIECE and L’INNOCENTE, as well as a handful of Tinto Brass’s works from THE KEY up to FALLO!