The Dead are Alive has the Italian title L’etrusco uccide ancora, which translates to The Etruscan kills again, which in turn is an alternative title to this film. It’s always exciting with titles and language on Italian films fromthe early ‘70s. They were cheap to make and they were distributed to a lot of countries, hence there were many titles. There were also often no original language tracks, the films were dubbed to the desired language. In this case it means that the language I viewed it in was English.
I have a strange connection with this, I usually despise dubbed films, they should be seen and experienced in their original language. But when it comes to these Italian gialli I’m much more forgiving. Maybe because there’s no existing original language track as I said before.
When I first read the plot I thought this was going to be some sort of zombie film. It takes place at an excavating site and during the excavation the professor in charge suspects that what’s dead in the Etruscan grave they’re dealing with might not be so dead after all. That was what I read anyway. I don’t see any evidence of this particular storyline when I see the movie. It plays out much more like a thriller – a giallo.
But it doesn’t have the usual aesthetics. At least not completely. There is no murderer wearing black gloves for instance. But one thing it really has in common with this kind of film is the fantastic colors. There is something special about the color of blood in these movies from the early ‘70s. It’s stylistic and beautiful. It might look fake enough but that’s beside the point. The visuals are at least as important as the plot and the realism in these movies.
And even if there’s no killer wearing black gloves in The Dead Are Alive, there are murders, and they’re bloody. Aesthetically beautiful in my mind. There are police investigating the murder but as it usually is with these movies there is also another investigator. It’s usually someone with a personal connection to the murders and so is the case here too. Often this part falls on a reporter or journalist, but in this case it falls on the professor in charge of the digging and investigation of the ancient grave, and incidentally the prime suspect for the murders.
More and more strange thing starts to happen and soon you suspect all and everyone of the characters. There are lots of red herrings which is also typical. It’s the nature of the gialli to lead the viewer into suspecting everyone, and the revealing of the killer at the end of the movie is often a surprise or something pretty far fetched.
I think The Dead Are Alive was more messy than usual in the suspicion of everybody. There were too many things going on I think. It was hard even to have a suspect. But at the end, the killer is exposed and the motive is, in fact, pretty far fetched. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. Beautiful film!
