MISTERIA "Body puzzle"

"Misteria" (aka "Body Puzzle") is a thriller directed in 1992 by Lamberto Bava (son of Mario Bava, the specialist of the Macabre). After her husband's death Tracy (Joanna Pacula) is the constant target of a fierce maniac killer who murders people close to her. All the victims are connected with one another through the fact that the murderer steals some of their organs. Michele, a cop (Tomas Arana) charged with doing the investigations, will discover that the maniac is trying to re-build someone's body. Since his debut as a director, Lamberto Bava has followed his father Mario's footsteps in the horror and thriller genres (he has directed very good horror movies like "Macabro" and Giallos like "La casa con la scala nel buio" and "Morirai a mezzanotte"). Especially in the thriller genre Lamberto has shown himslef as a deep expert of the tension and Giallo mechanisms. "Misteria" suffered a troubled distribution. Originally the movie had a more incisive title: "Body Puzzle"; unfortunately it was heavily censored with several cuts and underwent a limited distribution with the altered title "Misteria". Despite all of this, the Bava movie is a very good thriller and surely the best of all the movies produced in that period. Its strengths are a good cast and a scenario which perfectly amalgamates Giallo and Splatter ( amputations, eyes torn out etc.) and which makes this movie so enthralling and mysterious at the same time. In realizing this CD with a long duration of about 70 minutes which will make happy the Horror/Thriller/Noir fans, we could use all the full stereo master tapes vaulted at RCA. Carlo Maria Cordio is without anydoubt a specialist of the genre and his list of OSTs includes movies like "Absurd-Rosso sangue", "Killing Bird-uccelli assassini", "Aenigma", "Sodom's Ghost", "La casa 4", "Paura nel buio", "Streghe". For this movie Cordio has written an orchestral - electronic score with a very American sound concerning the instrumentation of the dissonant strings and of the brass clusters. The romantic side of the story is represented by the love theme for Tracy and Michele introduced in the version for piano and orchestra (Tr.8), for sax and orchestra (Tr.15) and then reprised in "Finale" (Tr.26). The terrible murders are scored with a large number of mysterious, suspenseful and often gloomy motifs where the cleverness and creativity of Cordio give interesting results.