Movie Reviews for Writers: Your Vice Is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key

Let’s just say first that this Giallo has a very long title that doesn’t seem to make sense unless you’ve seen more of Sergio Martino’s work, and The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh in particular. Also, it’s a fairly typical Eurosleaze that isn’t going to be everybody’s cup of wine. And did I mention it’s inspired by Poe’s The Black Cat?

Oliviero Rouvigny is a wash-up writer who hasn’t written a word in three years and is sleeping around with a bookstore worker, throwing extravagant orgies with the local hippy commune and abuses his wife, Irina. On top of all that, he’s also got a bit of a fetish for his mom’s memory as evidenced by his admiration for a dress of hers he still owns and her black cat, Satan, who now lives with him after her death. Anyway, women die and Oliviero becomes the chief suspect, but is he guilty, or is someone setting him up. And then the mystery deepens when his lovely and now grown-up niece arrives and plays games with both Oliviero and Irina. People die, plots twist, fake blood flows, and my brain reminds itself that this is just the way the best Giallos work.

The filming is beautiful. The characters are memorable. The plot twists keep me guessing. And all in all, this long-titled flick is a really nice piece of Eurosleeze if you’re a fan of the genre. If not, it won’t bring you over to the dark side. 

Now, enough about all that. What can we learn about being writers from this weird little Italian masterpiece?

Two things really stuck out to me as I watched it. 

The first comes when Oliviero is being questioned by the Inspector and is asked if he plans to take a trip anytime soon (the Italian version of “Don’t leave town. You’re a suspect” I suppose). When the writer responds that he isn’t going anywhere, the Inspector says, “A writer’s mind does all his wandering.”

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