Back in utero

For those who have seen the movie "What have you done to Solange?", you know how twisted and perverse the killer's method is.
And you probably also noticed that only one girl escapes this treatment: Elizabeth.
Elizabeth is killed as well. But she's the only girl to be drowned in her bath.

Even though the bathtub sequence is a classic in Giallo, this particular one carries in my opinion an interesting sense, considering the topics the film is dealing with:
Elizabeth, much like Solange, is a woman-child. But contrary to the latter and the other girls, she was a virgin, as we later find out. Because of this, she could not die the same way as the other victims - she was still "innocent".

And her death is visually very symbolic: seeing her in the bathtub water, it almost looks like she's floating into amniotic liquid.
Forever a child.

"Cosa avete fatto a Solange?" (Massimo Dallamano - 1972) can be found here.

Solange's silence

Solange's secret is one she shared with thousands of women in Europe until the 1970s. These women were strangled by shame. They could not talk about their secret. Society would not let them anyway, as they were considered outlaws. These women had aborted.
This is the very serious issue "What have you done to Solange?" was built on back in 1972.

Living in Italy or in France, you only had two options: either leave the country to have a legal abortion in a hospital in the UK or the Netherlands. Or abort in clandestinity - which usually meant dreadful conditions, leaving women wounded forever or even killing them (on this particular point it is noticeable that Solange Beauregard is probably French and that the film takes place in England, shot by an Italian director).

Contrary to a lot of gialli, here the women are somehow empowered: only them have the answer to the question raised in the title. Men don't know or don't understand. It's a women's secret.
But they are the victims as well. They form a shadow society which members are tied together by a common psychological and physical suffering. Solange's pain left her muted for ever. Wounded in such a way that she will never become a real woman. And neither revolve to be a child again.

Worse, the film demontrates she suffers in vain: by taking a revenge on the women Solange was the victim of, the killer spreads the barbary even further. Dallamano even manages to underline the ambiguous position of the Church, questioning its role as in other gialli, by showing the murderer dressing up as a priest to gain his preys' trust and have them revealing their terrible secrets.

Silence, secrets, taboo are the true killers of this desperate movie.
In this instance, "Solange" is a highly political giallo: it was urging everybody to bring the abortion issue to light and debate it publicly.

In France, abortion was legalized in 1974. In Italy, in 1978.

More on "What have you done to Solange?" here.

Hamilton meets Lynch

Part of the mysterious charm of "What have you done to Solange?" (Massimo Dallamano - 1972) is probably that it is a very elegant voyeur movie.

From the first seconds of the opening credits, where teenage girls are cycling through the countryside in an orange monochrome tone, we understand there is more to these images of innocence than meets the eye. And we want to know and see what it is.

Something terribly wrong floats in a gently erotic atmosphere, as if David Hamilton's and David Lynch's worlds had perfectly merged together to give birth to an evil kind of beauty. This is reinforced by Ennio Morricone's poisonous soundtrack, as sophisticated and aerial as ever.
It is a beauty which is irresistible, so innocent and perverse at the same time, so inaccessible... so close to its own tragic end.

This highly ambiguous shower scene perfectly encapsulates what this great giallo is: a twisted beauty you secretly watch through a keyhole.

More on "Solange" from this blog here.

What have you thought of Solange?

Liam, who is a professor at the University of New Mexico, contacted me yesterday. He is teaching a course in Giallo cinema (indeed this sounds interesting), and would like to gather information about Massimo Dallamano's "What have you done to Solange?" for a lecture next week.

If some of you have already investigated this giallo, or if you have seen a good analysis of it on the web, please post a comment on this article or contact me by email, I will be happy passing your precious point of view to him.

Many thanks in advance.