Seven Murders for Scotland Yard (1971)

Jack el destripador de Londres is of course a fantastic title, but I will stick with Seven Murders for Scotland Yard just because I'm lazy! I've seen this a second time now, and I must say it's starting to get higher and higher up on my Naschy-list of cool movies. Sure, it's cheap and silly, but it also has a lot of bloody murders, nice locations and Naschy in full macho-mode. 

Paul Naschy plays a crippled ex-trapeze artist, Peter Dockerman, that lives a bitter and slightly alcoholic life in London with his even more bitter wife. He spends most of his time drinking in bars, trying to find a job and get into fights with other drunks. When his wife is murdered by a Jack the Ripper-copycat he becomes the main suspect himself, and has to find the killer before the killer finds another victim. And regarding that detail, he fails totally, because there's one murder after another on the cold and rainy streets of London...

Seven Murders is a cheap, silly, fucked up little crap-movie. But ya know, I love every second of it. Somehow reminds me of French Sex Murders, because of the cheap and gritty look, but it's a much better movie. The murders are plenty, the gore is cheesy and bloody, the acting is most of the time quite good - Naschy himself is always good - but one of the ladies overacts during a scene that I almost thought it was satire, parody, whatever. My favorite scene is when a chopped of head is being delivered to the police station by the killer, and while there's a dialogue in the foreground, a policeman is showing the head (who's in a hat box) to his colleagues in the background. It's like some scene from The Naked Gun!

There's a lot to laugh at, but in the end it's also a satisfying "Spanish giallo". There's a murder every ten-fifteen minutes, often gory, and between there's a lot of red herrings, a bar fight or two, a lot of cool location footage from London and Naschy walking around look sad because the police is after him. The final twist is good, and I already forgot who the real killer was, which for me is a good thing with a murder mystery. José Luis Madrid, the directors, keeps our interest up and I must say I'm impressed. What could have been a real snoozer is now a fun, entertaining and sleazy giallo-wannabe that deserves more respect. Buy it.It's out on a grey market dvd which is anamorphic widescreen and is perfectly passable for that price.