Girl with a Straight Razor
James Cameron Teaches Filmmaking
A woman goes about at night killing people with a straight razor in Girl with a Straight Razor. Dressed all in red with a straight razor in hand, a woman (Ali Chappell) prowls during the night looking for victims to feed her blade. However, the woman finds herself haunted by both memories of her past a ghostly woman in black (Thea Munster).
Girl with a Straight Razor is a neo-Giallo horror film written and directed by Chris Alexander (Necropolis: Legion). The film stars Alexander’s regular collaborator Ali Chappell as both the titular Girl with the Straight Razor, as well as her nightly victims. As the story progresses, a supernatural element of the plot reveals itself, as we find out that this woman kills to please Lady Death, who made a dark bargain with the woman in the past.
Like most of Chris Alexander’s films, Girl with a Straight Razor focuses predominantly on visual storytelling, with there being very little dialogue. There can be some argument that the film is a bit style-over-substance, particularly in the first half of the film, which goes all-in on the neo-Giallo homages, such as red-tinted visuals and POV stalking of victims, leading to some very bloody kills courtesy of special effects artist Carlos Henriques and The Butcher Shop.
Girl with a Straight Razor does take some time to explore the past of the titular character, though the sparse 58-minutes running time doesn’t really leave much room for much serious character development[cm_simple_footnote id=”1″]. Ultimately, Girl with a Straight Razor is more about the combination of the carefully constructed visuals with the haunting score by Chris Alexander.
In fact, it can be argued that Girl with a Straight Razor is essentially a one-woman show for star Ali Chappell, who shows many different layers to a character who starts off seeming like a one-dimensional killer. Then there is musician and performance artist Thea Munster, aka Thea Triffid, who plays the only other on-screen character of Girl with a Straight Razor, who is credited as simply “Lady Death” and is indeed a ghostly grim reaper-like figure who haunts the titular character and is her main motivation for going on a nightly killing spree.
Overall, while Girl with a Straight Razor can be ultimately just be considered a neo-Giallo only for its visual style, rather than narrative, the film does benefit from a solid lead performance by Ali Chappell and enough bloody throat-slittings to satisfy the gorehounds.
Girl with a Straight Razor is available to order on Blu-ray from Darkside Releasing
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