The Italian Job: Phantom of Death

Michael York looks bemused.  Donald Pleasance seems to be in the throes of a mental breakdown, running around the streets of Venice shouting 'Come out you bastard, show yourself' and 'I'll fucking kill you' at an unseen (and possibly non-existent) adversary.  It can only be another Italian exploitation film featuring slumming British actors.  Whilst it is no surprise to see Pleasance in this kind of Euro-thriller (he seemed to be a permanent fixture in the genre in the seventies and eighties), it's quite a jolt to see Michael York headlining Ruggero Deodato's Phantom of Death.  Surely he wasn't so desperate for work by 1988 that he was having to do this sort of stuff?  Mind you, the glory days of Hollywood and Logan's Run were more than a decade in the past and the Austin Powers movies were still a long way off.  Which isn't to say that Phantom of Death is a film that York should be ashamed to put on his CV.  In places it looks very classy, with high production values and excellent Venice locations.  It also has an interesting premise: a concert pianist at the height of his powers is suddenly diagnosed with a hereditary degenerative condition which will cause premature ageing.  He consequently goes on a killing spree.  Which is where the film's problems begin.  His motivation for the murders is never really clear.  His first victim is his doctor, whose killing he follows up with the theft of his medical records, implying that he is trying to cover up his condition.  However, subsequent victims are ex-girlfriends, implying some kind of revenge motivation.  Later on, as his condition begins to take its physical toll, York rants about how he despises the young because they still have their lives ahead of them, and the old because they've had their lives but still linger on.  Feeling cheated out of his own life, he vows to kill them all.

The situation is further complicated by his decision to taunt the detective in charge of the case (Pleasance), pushing him to the point of insanity with mocking phone calls which make it clear that York has the detective under surveillance.  As part of his campaign against the cop, he threatens Pleasance's daughter, but never actually seems to make any move against her, instead murdering a policewoman colleague of the Inspector.  The plot's lack of focus is reflected by the movie's lack of pace - the version I watched ran just under ninety minutes (longer versions apparently exist), but felt longer.  Crucially, it fails to give much sense of timescale - toward the end Pleasance mentions that he's been tracking the killer for a year, but this passage of time isn't clear from the on-screen events.  However, the biggest problem with the film is the main protagonist.  Whilst York's ageing make-up is quite convincing and his performance effective, the reality is that a wheezing and decrepit killer ultimately poses little threat and, despite the number of people he manages to kill (mainly in the early stages of his degeneration, to be fair), he just doesn't seem menacing.  Indeed, his decrepitude tends to dictate the film's slow pace in its latter stages.  All of which makes it sound as if I'm saying the film is a stinker.  But, to be fair, it has many virtues - some nice visuals, some gory giallo-style murders and the novelty of seeing Donald Pleasance in a sympathetic role, (he gives a performance and a half as the case drives him half insane).  Moreover, the film's musings on the way we perceive people on the basis of age and the way in which the elderly are treated by society, with our apparent obsession with youth, are interesting and unexpected in a giallo.  All-in-all, Phantom of Death is an interesting watch, but badly needs better pacing and plotting.