Operazione paura (1966, Italy)

Melissa played by Valerio Valeri Dr. Eswai, a coroner, arrives in a secluded village in Carpathia, Romania, to perform a post mortem on a maid who died at Villa Graps, a decayed nobleman's house. The film is set at the end of the nineteenth century. During the post mortem examination, a gold coin is found in the dead girl's heart. This is revealed to fit in with a local superstition, that "Only with money in the heart, can one who meets a violent death ever rest in peace."

After the post mortem, some villagers attack Eswai and swear vengeance on him -- apparently for disturbing the matter of the death. Back at the inn, Eswai receives a note instructing him to join police Inspector Kruger at Villa Graps. When he goes there, he finds it to be mysterious and creepy. Years earlier, Baroness Graps laid a curse on the villagers when her little girl, Melissa, was trampled to death at the age of seven by drunken townspeople during the village festival. Now the ghost of Melissa walks the Villa. Eswai sees Melissa in the villa, and at first she runs off, and then re-appears; but then she runs off again down a spiral staircase.

This is a pretty typical Italian mystery film, with a lot of unexplained events, only some of which get resolved towards the end of the film.


Title credits for Valerio The seven-year-old ghost child Melissa is played by a boy, Valerio Valeri, as shown in the film titles. As far as I can find out, this was his only film role. The internet movie database erroneously has the role played by the female actress Valeria Valeri (in Italian, the final letter is significant as a gender specifier) but she was 41 years old when the film was made; IMDB also has a Valerio Valeri, but he was a producer in 1959.

The film is also known as:
Curse of the Dead
Curse of the Living Dead
Don't Walk in the Park (a title that has nothing whatsoever to do with the action in the film)
Kill, Baby, Kill and
Operation Fear

HF May 2007


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