Hatchet for the Honeymoon (1970)

[Hatchet For The Honeymoon 1969 Widescreen English 88 minutes] The HD blu ray treatment of this film is certainly worth the upgrade for all Mario Bava aficianados the picture quality is superb, the colors rich and vibrant, the contrast uncanny for a film this old. Over and over again while I was watching I had to remark to myself how gorgeous it was, unlike a lot of other blu ray flicks I 'upgraded' lately. The audio, however, is a slightly different story it appears that with each new reel of film, there's an abundance of snap, crackle, and popping and some hiss for around 20 seconds before it clears up. After that, it's fine. A minor distraction, but worth the trade for the video brilliance offered.

Not technically a gaillo, due to the fact that we know the killer's identity within three minutes as he gives an internal monologue declaring his psychological dilemma and love for killing women, this is still Bava working full throttle, though not necessarily paving new roads with this film. It's very different from his 'Bay of Blood', from the following year which, along with Sergio Martino's 'Torso', ushered in the slasher film about six years before John Carpenter's 'Halloween'. This is more like his other 60's film's, psychological horror without the gothic feel, yet the goth elements are evident everywhere the lead's wife is a spiritualist, the elaborate castle manor they live in, the creepy mannequins that dreadfully dominate and dictate his desire to kill, and the childhood murder that haunts him currently, puzzle pieces of which he still can't come to grips with all play out with elaborate visual splendor, as Bava also plays cinematographer as well as director.

Stephen Forsyth is excellent as the stylish, good-looking psychopath married to a shrew of a woman (Laura Betti) who won't grant him a divorce, as she holds the financial pursestrings, and makes his life more hellish than it already is considering all the emotional baggage he's burdened with. Dagmar Lassander is always a treat to watch, and was popular in around a half-dozen gailli and trailblazing Euro-exploitation films ('The Frightened Woman', 'Forbidden Photos of a Lady Above Suspicion' and 'Black Emmanuelle' come to mind), and there are a few other comely Eurobabes to keep your attention riveted to the sumptuous visuals as Bava does his thing, which is, for me, always fascinating to watch. And the cat-and-mouse game with the police inspector (Jesus Puente) adds to the fun, though we've seen it done before, by both Bava and his contemporaries. Of which he had few.

Another entertaining example of a genre created by this master of the macabre, 'Hatchet' may be slight on gruesome gore and arterial bloodspatter, but is a classic example of the 'less is more' old-school psychological horror prevalent back in the 60's. Bava would turn this genre around and reinvent it again with his next adventurous film, but here he plays it safe. Assuming that the serial-killing of new brides and being haunted by a ghost is your idea of safe. 4 stars.

"Hatchet for the Honeymoon" tells the story of John Harrington, an outwardly-normal man with recurring nightmares resulting from a childhood trauma the brutal murder his mother and her second husband on their wedding day. Though it always stops before he finds the identity of the murderer, John learns the dream progresses a bit further each time he murders a bride on her wedding day. Fortunately for John, as owner of Harrington House a high-end bridal salon he has access to an unlimited supply of brides to murder! Things go well until he decides to murder his nagging wife. What's more, a police inspector has begun to notice that the murdered brides are usually Harrington House clients.

The movie is not so lurid as it sounds, with the story concentrating on John's relationship with his wife, and the cat and mouse game he plays with the inspector. As with many Bava films, there is a double twist ending.

The Blu-ray is a great improvement over the earlier Image Entertainment DVD, and well worth upgrading for Bava fans. The price is reasonable (about $20 on Amazon) unlike many genre Blu-rays.

Buy Hatchet for the Honeymoon (1970) Now