This DVD was purchased by The Shine Box for a dollar at the 99cent store on Wyckoff Ave. and Stockholm Street at the border of Ridgewood, Queens and Bushwick, Brooklyn. The box gives the title Kiss Me, Kill Me, directed by Umberto Lenzi and starring Carroll Baker and Jean-Louis Trintignant. The Shine Box joined Pulp Serenade over a few beers to watch the flick.Turned out the actual disc inside was a different Italian movie, called Baby Yaga. This can happen when buying a movie at the 99cent store, and in this case it was serendipitous.
Baby Yaga is an adaptation of an illustrated series of fumetti by Guido Crepax. Fumetti, a new term for The Shine Box, are imaginatively wrought comics published in Italy, genre-bending erotic soap-operas that targeted adult readers. Not directed by cannibalaestro Umberto Lenzi, the movie is a good watch, helmed by Corrado Farina, a director with a vision, who made documentaries and wrote novels. Valentina, the hip photographer heroine, is shot upclose as if etched and colorized on the screen, and the music is grooved out. Carroll Baker is in it, as the Devil Witch, but no Jean-Louis...
