BA_Harrison Sadistic scoundrel Kurt (Christopher lee), black sheep of the family, returns home to find that absence hasn't exactly made the heart grow fonder: his father (Gustavo De Nardo), brother Christian (Tony Kendall), ex-lover Nevenka (Daliah Lavi) and housemaid Giorgia (Harriet Medin) still find him utterly loathsome. Unsurprisingly, Kurt winds up being murdered, but even death cannot stop his cruelty...In keeping with its Sadean theme, The Whip and the Body is both a pleasure to behold and a pain to endure: aesthetically, the film cannot be rivalled, with excellent costume and set design, and exquisite direction from Mario Bava, whose camera glides gracefully through pools of coloured light and ominous swathes of shadow to great effect; the story, however, is less impressive, a trite exercise in Gothic cliché, replete with a creepy cliff-top castle continually battered by strong winds and thunderstorms, a raft of morbid characters, all of whom harbour dark secrets, loads of tiresome symbolism, and some ridiculous psychological claptrap.The sado-masochistic nature of the central relationship between Kurt and Navenka (which is surprisingly way ahead of its time) prevents the film from attaining coma-inducing levels, but with extremely long periods where nothing much of interest happens, the film is far from the perfect perverted and poetic love story that its ardent supporters claim it to be.8 out of 10 for the lovely imagery, but 4/10 for the story—so that's an average rating of 6/10.

Lee Eisenberg Having seen a few of Mario Bava's movies, "La frusta e il corpo" (alternately called "What!?" and "The Whip and the Body" in English) was a bit of a disappointment just because much of the movie was kind of slow. It certainly has an interesting plot: Christopher Lee plays a disinherited member of a noble family who returns home, where he starts engaging in some nasty tactics. And it takes more than death to get rid of this guy! Apparently, the whipping scenes were a little extreme for the censors in 1963 (I wonder if that was for the violence or the sexual implications); nowadays it shouldn't be that intense. The mortuary scenes are the really cool ones.So anyway, this is far from my favorite Bava flick - "The House of Exorcism/Lisa and the Devil" takes that spot - but still worth seeing. Euro-horror will never get old! Also starring Daliah Lavi, Tony Kendall, Ida Galli, Harriet Medin, Gustavo De Nardo and Luciano Pigozzi.

Witchfinder General 666 With Italy being my favorite Horror-producing country, and Gothic Tales and Gialli my favorite sub-genres, it is not surprising that I regard Italian Horror-pioneer Mario Bava, sublime master of the first- and inventor of the second category, as one of the greatest geniuses in the history of Motion Pictures. Unlike any other Horror director, Bava made most of his films so ingeniously that it is very hard to name favorites, simply due to the fact that this great man's repertoire includes so many flawless masterpieces. Bava's doubtlessly most brilliant film is the 1960 masterpiece "La Maschera Del Demonio" (aka. "Black Sunday"), which is, as far as I am concerned, one of the greatest films ever made, but the man created several other flawless films that no Horror lover or even cinema-fan in general could afford to miss. Such as this overwhelming film, for example. In 1963, the same year in which he invented the Giallo-sub-genre with his milestone "La Ragazza Che Sappeva Troppo" and furthermore created the arguably most memorable Horror omnibus ever with "I Tre Volti Della Paura", Bava also brought us this wonderful Gothic gem named "La Frusta E Il Corpo" (aka. "The Whip And The Body"), a film which perfectly illustrates what a brilliant director he was. "The Whip And The Body" is the absolute proof that, unlike any other director, Mario Bava had a unique talent of combining beauty and terror in a most mesmerizing manner. The need of a a high quality copy is something i seldom find essential, and yet I would highly recommend to watch "La Frusta E Il Corpo" in the highest possible quality. Whenever using the pause-button on the remote control, one has the impression of looking at a beautifully haunting painting. This is no exaggeration, but merely the only proper description of how visually overwhelming this dream-like Gothic masterpiece is.Horror-icon Christopher Lee, as far as I am concerned one of the greatest actors ever, gives a brilliant performance as one of his most haunting and sardonic characters here. The ravishing Daliah Lavi is as stunningly beautiful as the film itself, and she also delivers a stunning performance in the female lead. The supporting performances are also great, the cast includes Italian genre-regulars as Tony Kendall and Ida Galli. I will not give a long plot description as everybody should be capable of drifting into the dreamlike Horrors of Castle Menliff on their own. I do want to say though, that "The Whip And The Body" is a unique and fascinating mix of Gothic Horror and S&M love-story. The eerie castle is the perfect setting for this wonderful film, which takes place in the early 19th century. The brilliant score is as mesmerizing and hauntingly beautiful as the film's visual style - "The Whip And The Body" simply is a film that overwhelms all senses a film possibly can. This was originally intended to resemble the story of Roger Corman's 1961 masterpiece "The Pit And The Pendulum" (another favorite of mine), but it turned out entirely different, the brilliant Gothic eeriness, castle setting and great acting being the only mutual elements. Mario Bava created many masterpieces in his impressive career, and all of them have something particularly essential about them. "La Frusta E Il Corpo" is a film that shows this man's unique talent for atmosphere and the combination of the beautiful and the uncanny. This is one of the most visually overwhelming Horror films ever made, and easily deserves the highest rating of 10/10!

Matthew Janovic This is undeniable-proof that Mario Bava was one of the best horror-directors of all-time. The maestro's use of color and unnatural-lighting is stellar, and unique. There are few films that convey desire so-deeply, so-yearningly, but also depict repulsion just-as-well; and aren't the two inextricably-entwined in horror? It is perhaps the best Gothic-horror film of the 1960s, bar-none, and that includes some of Hammer's finest. In-fact, you can see that in Bava's, Hammer's and Roger Corman's 'Gothic' films, there is a dialog going-on. They copied-each other, but few would be so-daring as Bava, as this is the best S&M horror-film, and the sexiest too. Dahlia Lavi couldn't be more desirable in this, and the S&M depictions are pretty racy, even the standards of 2006. For this reason, it was radically-cut in most regions-of-distribution (except-Germany!). 'Black Sunday/Mask of Satan' (1960) may have been the 'Citizen Kane' of horror, but this is Bava's 'Tales of Hoffmann' (1951), and all these films should be seen by serious horror-fans. Corman, AIP and Hammer had blood, brains, bulging-boobs and cleavage, but not this! It is probably the most-underrated film I have ever seen. A film like The Whip and the Body has to be watched-repeatedly to truly-appreciate, and it gives-up secrets with each-viewing. What has always been a shoddy dubbing-job has marred this film's reputation and relegated it to-the-margins of the horror-genre. The Whip and the Body is the essence of what truly makes-up horror, especially Gothic-horror, and it is psycho-sexual-tension. If you cannot appreciate such literary-concerns, or the eternal-issues involving the human-condition, you aren't going to enjoy it, because it is a pretty literary-film. It is poetic, and strongly-erotic. It is also, decidedly-not 'PC', but who cares anymore about that? Art never is, nor should it be, 'acceptable.' It simply is.Outside-of Hitchcock, psychological-horror doesn't get much-better than this masterpiece. It is a ghost-story, and so-much-more. It is a study of sexual-obsession, and the demons that haunt all relationships. Who has not been haunted by a lover from one's past? If you haven't, you are missing-something important in the human-condition, so go out and find it. The archetype of the 'demon-lover' is in full-bloom in this masterpiece, and it is titillating and emotionally-powerful for it. It should also be said the film has a few-similarities to Ricardo Freda's classic, 'The Ghost' (1963), which is likely due to the era it was made-in, and the fact that Bava was frequently Freda's assistant-director. Guilt plays-its-part in the films of both directors, usually manifesting as an apparition. Catholic-guilt? This is likely, but neither Bava or Freda can be typed so-easily, they were non-conformists in their stylizations, with Bava even showing a connection with Slavic-literature in the works of Gogol and Tolstoy. He borrowed from a lot of literary-sources, including Lovecraft, making it into something that was his own. The director was also known for his belief in Italian folk-superstitions, and he drew from Italy's folklore, and Roman mythology as well.As far as I can tell, much of the 'color-coding' in this film for given-characters was relatively-new when Bava attempted-it. Powell & Pressberg's 'Tales of Hoffman' is the closest I can recall with this style conveying horror so effectively. Lee's-character (Kurt Menliff) is portrayed in the cobalt-hues of blue ever to grace a Technicolor-film, suggesting the character spectral-nature. Other times, Lee is lit with a green-light on his face, like Osiris. I'd say some aspects of the film resemble the myth of the resurrection of Osiris by Isis (through sexuality). Lee is the dying-god, Nevenka his Astarte or Isis. Scenes of passion with Dahlia Lavi are decidedly red-in-hue, while when the apparition of 'Kurt' gives us scenes that are green or blue. One scene has Lavi walking-down a hallway while each side of her face keeps changing-colors as her emotions change. The whole approach is a kind of expressionism of color, the hues conveying the internal-states of the characters. The Technicolor-process made colors so deep! This is film-as-artifice, and we should never forget this while viewing the works of a director like Bava, he reveled in this artificiality. This helped him emphasize the thematic visually, rather than through dialog and a linear-narrative. Yes, it's supposed-to look 'fake', it's a film-reality, like in a Tarantino-film. This movie has suffered-enough! The story-line isn't very difficult to follow, it's just the poor-dubbing by the Italian production-company. When a film is this low-budget (for 1963), it's usually post-production that suffers, and it does here. The owners of this property should record Mr. Lee's dialog for this film-- he has offered, after-all, so why-not? It's insane to think the producers of a film with Christopher Lee would not see-fit to use his actual-voice, because he is an actor who was known for it (and still is).