Footprints is a very interesting movie that is somewhat difficult to categorize. "Psychological thriller" is the most appropriate description I can think of. The female protagonist, Alice Cespi, discovers that she doesn't remember anything of the last three days. The only clue she has is a torn photo of a hotel. She is also haunted by a recurring, very vivid, dream about a science fiction movie that she believes she saw many years ago. In her pursuit of the truth behind her amnesia she doesn't trust anyone, but little by little it becomes obvious that she has visited the town where the hotel is located before. This is an exciting flick whose main virtue is that it is virtually impossible to predict how the events will unfold, and particularly, how it will end. The unusual loneliness of the main character and the unreliability of everyone else ensure that the good old paranoid feeling is present throughout the film, whereas beautiful colors and some spectacularly filmed sequences make this a visually attractive movie as well. The important part of the one and only Nicoletta Elmi, everyone's all time favorite redheaded obnoxious child star of Italian horror, is an extra bonus.
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runamokprods7 December 2011Interesting and entertaining 'mind game', dream-like, moody mystery, as a woman can't account for several lost days of her life, or why so many people at a resort she's never visited seem to know her.
She's also haunted by very odd black and white dreams where an astronaut is betrayed and left to die alone on the moon.
The film is slow in parts, and some of the big twists are easy to see coming, but it is beautifully photographed by Vittorio Storraro, and eschews the gratuitous violence and awkward sex of most of the Italian thrillers of the era.
This doesn't feel like its trapped by any formula or rules. And the acting is pretty good for a dubbed film.
Not in the class of films like 'Don't Look Now" or "Vertigo", but gets points for trying to be and doing so in a classy way. I'll be interested to see this again. -
novax6730 September 2005This is actually a very good surreal mystery movie, despite the description that tries to sell it as a Sci-Fi movie. Balkan stars as a woman haunted by mysterious visions and lost memories that she is trying to piece together. She spends the majority of the movie trying to make sense of her visions. Very atmospheric and effective. It is true that Kinski does not appear very much in this film, but the staring actors are very good. There is only an English dubbed version available in the US, and the dubbing leaves something to be desired, but the actors do a very good job. The cinematography, by Academy Award winner Vittorio Storaro is excellent. An earlier Giallo by director Bazzoni, THE FIFTH CORD, is also excellent, and also lensed by Storarro.
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lazarillo16 July 2006This is why I love Italian gialli. Despite the somewhat true but nevertheless very tiresome claims that the Italian filmmakers are just rip-off artists, this one loose genre that only really had its heyday for a few years in the early 70's displays more originality and creativity than mainstream Hollywood films have in the last 20 years. (And some American fanboy directors like Quentin Tarantino have largely made their career by ripping THEM off).This film is not only unlike any other gialli; it's unlike any other movie I've seen. A woman (Florinda Bolkan) is haunted in her dreams by a long ago television show she saw of astronauts being left stranded on the moon. To relax she goes to an eerily deserted seaside resort town where she thinks she's never been , but where everyone seems to remember her visiting the week before. She gets more and more paranoid and confused. Meanwhile strange men in astronaut suits keep appearing. . .
Unlike the typically hysterical-from-the-get-go gialli, this movie gradually creates a sense of paranoia and unease. It mixes dream, reality, memory, and the media (television) to the point where the viewer is left as disoriented as the troubled protagonist. The end is bound to be a little disappointing after the build-up, but it's pretty memorable too.
While most gialli have an overabundance of characters, this movie is largely carried by Bolkan. Fortunately, she is more than up to the task. Bolkan was a Brazilian actress who, like Austrian beauty Marissa Mell, had a career that was often overshadowed by her personal life (and she probably didn't help this with her lesbian affairs and public claims of having been JFK's last lover). Unlike Mell though she was much more than just a pretty face and her talent can readily be seen in movies like this, Fulci's "A Lizard in Women's Skin", and the nunsploitation classic "Flavia, the Heretic". Klaus Kinski and the Ida Galli also put in brief cameos in the movie, and unfortunately so does young Nicoletta Elmi (who was kind of the Dakota Fanning of 70's Italian films--not a terrible actress but one that appeared in so many films you start to look forward to seeing her on the back of a milk carton).
Director Luigi Bazzoni's first giallo "The Fifth Cord" just came out on DVD. Hopefully, this one won't be far behind. Snap it up if you like gialli or if just enjoy unique, well-made movies. Highly Recommended. -
BandSAboutMovies29 December 2018Alice Cespi (Florinda Bolkan, A Lizard in a Woman's Skin) watched a strange film in her childhood called "Footprints on the Moon," where astronauts were stranded on the moon's surface. Now, as an adult, the only sleep she gets is from tranquilizers and she starts missing days of her life. Get ready for a giallo that skips the fashion and outlandish murders while going straight for pure weirdness.
After losing her job as a translator, Alice find a torn postcard for a resort area called Garma. That's where she meets a little girl named Paula (Nicoletta Elmi, Demons, A Bay of Blood) who claims that Alice looks exactly like another woman she met named Nicole, who is also at the resort. Slowly but surely, our heroine starts to believe that a huge conspiracy is against her.
This is the last theatrical film of Luigi Bazzoni (he has directed some documentaries and wrote a few films since), who also directed The Fifth Cord. There are only two murders, but don't let that hold you back. There are also abrupt shifts in color and a slow doomy mood to the entire proceedings. It's unlike any other giallo I've seen and I mean that as a compliment.
Klaus Kinski also shows up as Blackman, the doctor who was behind the experiment that Alice saw as a child. He's only in the film for a minute or so, but he makes the most of his time, chewing up the scenery as only he can. And cinematographer Vittorio Storaro, beyond working on The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, also was the DP on films like Apocalypse Now, Reds, Last Tango in Paris and Dick Tracy.
Shameless Films, who are the folks to order this from, referred to it as "the loneliest, most haunting and beautiful giallo you will ever see." I have to agree - especially with its shocking ending. This isn't like any of the films that came in the wake of The Bird with the Crystal Plumage and it's a shame that its director didn't make more films in the genre. -
Luigi Bazzoni's "Le Orme" aka. "Footprints on the Moon" (1975) is possibly the most atypical film that can be attributed to the Giallo (sub-)genre. Director Bazzoni, who had previously directed a more typical, but less interesting Giallo with "Giornata Nera Per L'Ariete" ("The Fifth Cord", 1975), leaves out almost all the trademark elements of the traditional Giallo here, the most obvious being that (almost) no gory murders are taking place. Instead, "Le Orme", which, in its mystery character may nonetheless be called a Giallo, is a slow-paced, surreal, eerie and extremely convoluted and complex psychological mystery. The level of mystery is even higher than usual for Gialli, to a degree where the viewer often has no clue whatsoever what is going on. "Le Orme" is furthermore doubtlessly the only Giallo to feature an extraterrestrial sub-plot (as the English title suggests, the moon plays a role).
The wonderful Florinda Bolkan stars as Alice Crespi, a protagonist whose persona alone leaves many mysteries. Alice, a Portuguese translator living in Rome, who is tormented by a recurring nightmare, wakes up one day with no recollection of the foregoing three days. When she finds a photograph of a hotel on the Turkish island Garma, she decides to go there and investigate. Strangely, even though she has never been there, several people on the island seem to recognize Alice or confuse her with another woman...
It is almost impossible to give a proper plot description of "Le Orme" since the film relies strongly on atmosphere. Alice gets involved deeper and deeper in a mystery she has no clue how to solve; and neither do the viewers. Stylistically, the film is perfect: Stunningly beautiful Turkish sceneries are captured by a fantastic photography, (cinematographer Vittorio Storano also did the cinematography for "Apolcalypse Now" as well as Dario Argento's brilliant debut "L'Uccello Dalle Piume Di Cristallo" and Bernardo Bertolucci's "Novecento"), and the atmosphere is intensified by a wonderful classical score. The beautiful Florinda Bolkan is a great actress, and she is fantastic in the leading role here. Bolkan always had a talent to play women on the edge of sanity (e.g. in Lucio Fulci's great Gialli "Don't Torture A Duckling" and "Lizzard in a Woman's Skin", and, in a different manner, in Gianfranco Mingozzi's "Flavia the Heretic"), and her performance is particularly involving here (not least because we don't know whether she is is going insane, or the victim of a conspiracy). The rest of the cast includes Italian Horror's greatest child star, the always fantastic Nicoletta Elmi (Argento's "Profondo Rosso", Bava's "Baron Blood" and "Bay of Blood", etc.), and, in the dream-like sequences, none other than the incomparable Klaus Kinski as a sinister scientist.
If you are looking for the typical Giallo in which an insane killer targets ravishing beauty-queens, with gory murders and tons of sleaze, you better look elsewhere. What "Le Orme" provides, is mystery and suspense in a different, but highly involving and unsettling manner. Those who aren't familiar with the Giallo genre are well advised to watch a variety of other genre films (such as "The Red Queen Kills 7 Times", "What Have You Done To Solange", "Don't Torture A Duckling" or any of the Gialli by Sergio Martino and Dario Argento) before this one. However, it is a top recommendation for the more experienced Giallo-fans, especially those who are not deterred by the lack of action and appreciate a bizarre storyline. Definitely one of a kind. 7.5/10 -
matheusmarchetti28 June 2010Yet another forgotten, but nonetheless spellbinding 70's horror, and easily among my favorites of the genre, and a very unique one indeed. On the same vein of Peter Weir's eerie "Picinc at Hanging Rock" and paying tribute to Alain Resnais's equally enigmatic "Last Year in Marienbad", the film deals with an unsolved mystery left open to interpretation, with a character from the modern world finding herself trapped in an ancient, enigmatic setting. Unlike most Italian horror films of it's time, this one has hardly any blood at all, and relies mostly on creating a claustrophobic atmosphere and the horror of the unknown prowling every corner. The suspense builds up slowly to a terrifying and ultimately saddening finale. The film has many important names in Italian cinema working on it, such Vittorio Storaro (visually, this is one of the genre's most jaw dropping works), underrated writer/director Luigi Bazzoni, composer Nicola Piovani and giallo queen Florinda Bolkan, all doing wonderfully in what they are set out to do. The latter gives a stunning performance in the lead role, and we identify with her so much that even when you know she's actually crazy, we can't help to believe what she believes, that Klaus Kinski and his assistants are using her as a guinea pig for their sadistic experiments. Another bonus are the B&W nightmare sequences of the astronaut being left to die alone on the moon, which are very disturbing and scary. These dream sequences mirrors the protagonist's desperation as she too is trapped in a setting of which she is unfamiliar with, or is she? It's these sorts of questions that Bazzoni asks the audience, without always giving as answers, something that, in my humble opinion, makes the horror of it all the more effective. Overall, 10/10.
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Alice (Florinda Bolkan), a translator living in Italy, discovers that she has a memory loss and can't recall the last couple of days. She starts to follow a trace of memory fragments, which leads her to the small town of Garma. People in the town seem to recognize her and she's beginning to suspect that the re-occurring nightmares of astronauts conducting horrible experiments has something to do with her own amnesia.
The movie is interesting and the plot is good, but it's a bit to slow moving and arty for my taste. The plot takes some nice twists and it's really hard to figure out where it's heading. Florinda Bolkan is good in her role (but even better in "Flavia the Heretic") and it's always nice to see "star" child actor Nocoletta Elmi. Klaus Kinski's role is too small though. This is not a movie for the die-hard gore hound or exploitation addict, but still a very nice hour-and-a-half mystery. -
Icons7628 April 2005A very insightful psychological thriller! Footprints is a stylish example of the 70's powerful Italian film making.And Luigi Bazzoni, a wrongly underrated director and visually amazing 'auteur'. The movie develops its unusual plot with an incredibly suspenseful atmosphere and never disappoints,especially in its sad and dramatic finale! Florinda Bolkan delivers an excellent performance,rich of nuances and touching sensitivity,being able to portray a dark lady who is not only fascinating,but also painfully real and tragically lonesome.But the all cast is a treat,as well! Lila Kedrova,Nicoletta Elmi(the mysterious kid by the beach),Italian screen legend Caterina Boratto and stunningly beautiful B movie queen Evelyn Stewart in the brief but haunting role of the protagonist's friend! And Klaus Kinski in a surprisingly disturbing cameo! It's peculiar to notice how incredibly well done movies like Footprints were! Vittorio Storaro's moody and creepy cinematography,stylized locations and sets,Nicola Piovani's haunting score and first of all the story,so intense and disturbing,so intelligently layered and structured! A thriller with fantastic elements,but especially with a soul and a personal vision. I wish movies like Footprints would not be forgotten! I wish the movies were more insightful and personal today as they were back in the 60's/70's! And yes..i wish somebody will soon make a digitally remastered widescreen DVD out of this little masterpiece!
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Stevieboy66625 March 2019Le Orme. A Portuguese translator living in Italy finds herself drawn to the island of Garma in a bid to solve mysteries and nightmares that are haunting her. Despite a picture of astronauts on the DVD cover this is not science fiction. Neither would I call it horror or giallo. Psychological thriller best describes it. There is no gratuitous nudity or violence so often seen in Italian movies from this period. Furthermore it is a slow burn so those wanting fast thrills go elsewhere. Footprints does boast some superb cinematography and beautiful locations. Despite obvious dubbing it is also well acted. Sadly, however, Klaus Kinski has only a very minor role. For sure it is bizarre and surreal but my problem with Footprints is that it becomes very hard to follow what is going on and has one of those endings that had me trying to figure out actually happened. A second viewing may make more sense, but as it is pretty slow I'm not sure I'd want to sit through it again, despite some visual delights.
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claudio_carvalho11 April 2017The translator Alice Cespi (Florinda Bolkan) has nightmares with an astronaut left alone on the moon and is addicted in sleeping pills. When she goes to work, she is fired since she missed three days without any justification. She returns home and finds a torn postcard of the Garma Hotel in Garma and decides to visit the seaside touristic place. She stumbles upon the weird girl Paola Bersel (Nicoletta Elmi), the stranger Harry (Peter McEnery) and other locals that believe she is a woman called Nicole. Along the days, Alice tries to unravel the mystery of her missing days.
"Le orme", a.k.a. "Footprints on the Moon", is a weird film with a dream-like atmosphere. The intriguing mystery is supported by magnificent performance of Florinda Bolkan and great cinematography. However the confused story disappoints the viewer that expects a conventional giallo with gore, murders and sex. My vote is five.
Title (Brazil):"Os Passos" ("The Steps")
Note: On 15 June 2020 I saw this film again. -
When, oh, when will someone like Anchor Bay or Blue Underground release this on widescreen DVD??? Le Orme, which I only know because of my rare/vintage video collecting habit, is a film in my collection that I would not only sit through, but actually enjoy watching. The fact that Klaus Kinski is top billed, but is only in small parts of the film, means little to me. (Though several comments expressed disappointment in his rather limited screen time.) I cannot say that this is a good horror film, a good mystery, a sci-fi epic or anything of that nature. It is simply unclassifiable in the "genre" sense of things. It is more like a confusing, frightening (though not particularly violent or bloody) dream, filled with great visuals and mystery. It relies on visuals and emotion, much like Bava's "Lisa and the Devil". Both films are beautiful in almost every sense, but almost impossible to describe in a logical manner; they both occur in such a dream-like atmosphere. Don't be deterred by Force Video's synopsis on the back cover. It is infinitely more complex and intriguing than that. Though Force Video's release from 1986 (the only one in the US, that I know of) is cropped to full-screen on tape, even in that format it is still great. Releasing it remastered and/or letterboxed would make it magnificent (hint, hint... DVD companies).
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nikhil71797 February 2013Unable to cope with mounting pressures at work and haunted by visions of a lone astronaut abandoned on the surface of the moon, Alice travels to the exotic sea side town of Garma to get away from it all.
She encounters a number of people there who claim to know her from earlier as Nicole, even though she insists this is her first time there. Brazillian born Florinda Bolkan turns in a solid performance as the elusive Portugese translator caught in the grips of a fugue.
A strange but oddly compelling existential mystery about dual identities and self-fulfilling prophecies, Footprints on the moon is more reminiscent of art-house favorites such as Antonioni's L'aventura and Passenger and Resnais' Last Year at Marienbad, than say other Mystery/Thriller Genre fare so popular at the time in Italy.
The story unfolds at a languorous pace and things get redundant after a while, but it does allow Cinematographer extraordinaire Vittorio Storaro to really explore the unique locations and dazzle with his wonderfully dexterous camera-work. He furthers the style he pioneered in The Conformist.
Also, watch out for Klaus Kinski in a small role as a sinister Space Commander on the lookout for guinea pigs to conduct his secret experiments for a shadowy Government agency. Yes, I'm talking about the same movie. -
A slim but occasionally thrilling giallo yarn with an offbeat plot that might be of interest to cult fans: the inclusion of a bizarre and spooky black and white science fiction film that makes repeated appearances throughout the movie, concerning an astronaut who finds himself abandoned on the lunar landscape after being deserted by his crew mates. What this has to do with the rest of the movie is unclear but it certainly makes things more interesting. Otherwise this is a character-focused mystery that falls under the definition of being a "giallo", although the main elements of the giallo - ie. the murders - are missing here, replaced by subtlety, atmosphere, and tons of mystery.
FOOTPRINTS ON THE MOON is a rather slow-going experience, tough to sit through due to the fact that absolutely nothing happens in the movie until the last ten minutes. Sure, lots of different characters are introduced and segments of the puzzle unearthed or remembered, but nothing in the way of action actually happens to further the plot in anyway. In fact, aside from the ending, the rest of the film chronicles Bolkan's attempt to discover what has happened in her past, events which are gradually uncovered in flashback. Despite being an uncomfortable viewing experience, there are numerous factors in this film's favour, not least the engaging turn from lead Florinda Bolkan, never better as the woman frustrated by her own identity. Although her amnesia is a done-to-the-death plot device, the formula still works in places and the heavy air of mystery and suspense makes things more bearable.
Numerous familiar faces pop up in the cast, including fellow giallo veteran Evelyn Stewart (aka Ida Galli), wasted in a nothing role. Annoying redhead child Nicoletta Elmi (who later grew up in DEMONS) proves pivotal in helping Bolkan uncover some of her secrets, whilst veteran performer John Carlsen (THE SHE BEAST) makes an almost cameo appearance. But it's Klaus Kinski who is the most memorable, in an extremely small but important part as another kooky weirdo, and the film makes excellent use of his presence. Another memorable factor is the strong score by Nicola Piovani, which helps add to the experience. The ending, which I refer to repeatedly throughout this review, is unsettling and deeply horrifying stuff, best resembling a nightmare from which the protagonist cannot awake, definitely the strongest moment the film has to offer. Sadly the rest of the movie just can't match it. -
chaos-rampant26 October 2011I consider this a missed opportunity. I have very fond memories of the filmmaker's debut, an interesting psychosexual oddity called La Donna Del Lago, and watching this I'm inclined to think that earlier film worked so well because the giallo had not been mapped down yet; so he was free to travel where it was novel at the time. Polanski got there that same year, but he was already a name and had Deneuve with him and so made the bigger splash. Film history has noted Repulsion.
This could have been even better. He has brought ambitious imagination with him, a visual palette of bright golden hues and relaxing blues, a sense of place and folded mysterious time with memory from Marienbad. He has Vittorio Storaro's eye behind the lens.
The opening is more than promising. A woman wakes up with no memory of three days past. She has just seen a dream, a feverish vision of astronauts staggering on blasted moonscapes, which she remembers is from a movie called the same as the one we're watching; but a movie she left without watching the ending. She goes to Italy to investigate, in an effort to bring these images into focus.
There it falls apart, in Italy incidentally. In the ten years since that first film that was in some ways a giallo ancestor the genre had come and was already on its way out. Between these two films Bazzoni had worked where it was the trend in the Italian industry, making a western and another giallo called The Fifth Chord. So when the more ambitious material for this came together, there were already footsteps he was expected to walk and had been trained to. The circumstances of a commercial movie industry were just so.
So for the middle part of the film we get a giallo worked from convention. The convoluted plot where each character withholds crucial information until the time is right, and the protagonist has to cobble together a puzzle from clues and red herrings. Much ado.
It comes full circle in the finale; the agents which she has imagined to be controlling her illusion return to pull her back into the fiction of the dream. It happens with extraordinary images of a stretch of empty cosmic beachside.
Bazzoni never made another film after this. In the meantime, Polanski had rocketed into Hollywood orbit and was already on his way out. I reckon that Bazzoni was one of our sad losses, but alas he never made it to France where money didn't always expect to fill a double-bill. -
"Le Orme," or Footprints is an Italian film that is often loosely classified as a giallo. The film is mysterious and suspenseful, typical of gialli; however, footprints lacks the gratuitous nudity and gore typical of the genre. In addition, the themes of outer space and moon walking are atypical in a genre focused on more earthly endeavors. The most distinguishing aspect of this film is the mood created by the combination of story, camera work, and cinematography. Footsteps manages to elicit a darkly unsettling mood not commonly accomplished in gialli or any other genre for that matter.
This film defies review for the simple and common reason that revealing the assumptions of the filmmaker means revealing the ending. Footprints is a film with a twist ending that ties up all of the loose ends left throughout the film. In that sense alone, the movie is quite well done. Without giving too much away, the film is comparable in mood to Scorsese's Shutter Island. The story hinges on a woman accounting for her whereabouts from earlier in the week. She seems to be suffering from amnesia. Yet, as the film progresses, something more sinister may be a foot. Like Shutter Island, the film takes the audience along on the confusing, cryptic, and paranoia fueled journey of a protagonist puzzling out what exactly the reality of the situation is. The story of Footprints is subtle and spooky. The lonely setting, sparse yet textured visuals, and use of a variety of camera techniques all act in harmony to create an oppressive mood that is both creepy and enjoyable. The main point being conveyed is that the film is aptly described as visceral. The crowning accomplishment of Footprints is that the audience experiences the palette of emotions in synchrony with the protagonist.
As a whole, this is a wonderful film that truly engrosses the audience. As with many gialli, the movie comes off as a bit long. The filmmakers lavish time on creating the moods and ambiance wanted. This slowness is the only potential flaw in the film. "Potential," is used as pacing and contextual needs do seem to be very subjective. Overall, this is a wonderful exploration of confusion and the paranoia caused by said confusion.
On a personal note, I will definitely be recommending this film to friends. Footprints does not make the best Friday movie night film, as it is noticeably downbeat. That said, this is a film to recommend for movie discussion groups. The title is often unknown and the story/techniques are extremely well done. 7 of 10 stars. -
Bunuel19765 June 2008I first heard of this one while searching the 'Net for reviews of another Italian giallo/horror effort, the contemporaneous THE PERFUME OF THE LADY IN BLACK (1974; whose R2 SE DVD from Raro Video, by the way, I recently acquired) where it's referenced as being in a similar vein but also just as good. Having watched FOOTSTEPS for myself now, I can see where that reviewer was coming from in that both films deal with the psychological meltdown of their female protagonist. Stylistically, however, this one owes far more to Art-house cinema than anything else in particular, the work of Alain Resnais and Michelangelo Antonioni (and, specifically, LAST YEAR IN MARIENBAD [1961] and THE PASSENGER [1975] respectively); accordingly, some have accused it of being "deadly boring" an epithet often attached to such 'pretentious' (read: cerebral) fare!
Anyway, the film involves the quest of a woman (Florinda Bolkan) to determine her movements in the preceding three days of which she seems to have no recollection. Following a series of cryptic clues, she travels to the 'mythical' land of Garma (nearby locations, then, bear the equally fictitious names of Muda and Rheember) where she encounters several people (including Lila Kedrova as an aristocratic regular of the resort) who ostensibly recall the heroine staying there during her 'blackout'! Most prominent, though, are a young man (Peter McEnery) and a little girl (Nicoletta Elmi, from Mario Bava's BARON BLOOD [1972]) the former always seems to happen on the scene at propitious moments, while the latter apparently confuses Bolkan with another woman (sporting long red hair and a mean streak!).
While essentially a mood piece, this is nonetheless a gripping puzzle: inevitably, vague events transpire at a deliberate pace and where much of the film's power derives from the remarkable central performance (which can be seen as an extension of Bolkan's role in the fine Lucio Fulci giallo A LIZARD IN A WOMAN'S SKIN [1971]). However, there's no denying the contribution of cinematographer Vittorio Storaro (who provides any number of sweeping camera moves and an effective color scheme adopting orange/red/blue filters to create atmosphere and coming up with a saturated look for the disorientating, bizarre finale) and Nicola Piovani's fitting melancholy score (the composer is best-known nowadays for his Oscar-winning work on Roberto Benigni's Holocaust-themed tragi-comedy LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL [1997]).
With this in mind, it's worth discussing how FOOTSTEPS was presented in the version I watched: well, being apparently hard-to-get in its original form (I can't be sure whether it's uncut here or not, except to say that the film ran for 89 minutes while the IMDb lists it at 96), this edition is culled from a fairly battered English-language VHS (the dubbing is surprisingly good, given the international cast) with burnt-in Swedish subtitles to boot (besides, the DivX copy froze for a few seconds at a crucial point in the story around the 82-minute mark)! Still, we do get a welcome bonus i.e. a 9-minute 'Highlights From The Soundtrack' in MP3 format.
I realize I haven't yet mentioned the moon mission subplot, to which Klaus Kinski's presence is restricted: incidentally, around this same time, he had a similarly brief but pivotal role in another good arty thriller with sci-fi leanings (and also set in a distinctive location) namely, LIFESPAN (1974). As I lay watching the film, I couldn't fathom what possible connection this had with the central plot except that Bolkan mentioned a recurring dream about a movie she had once seen, though not through to the end, called "Footsteps On The Moon" (a somewhat misleading alternate title for the film itself) amusingly, she at first recalls the picture as being called BLOOD ON THE MOON (which, of course, is a classic 1948 Western noir with Robert Mitchum and directed by Robert Wise!). That said, I took this 'diversion' in stride as merely one more outlandish touch to the film (given also Bolkan's former employment as a translator at a conference discussing Earth's future) and certainly didn't expect the astronauts to turn up on Garma's beach at the very end to pursue the female lead, where the sand then turns ominously into the moon's surface !
The film's plot will probably make more sense on a second viewing though, to be honest, this is best approached as a visual/aural experience and one shouldn't really expect it to deliver a narrative that's in any way clear-cut and easily rationalized! For the record, the only other Bazzoni effort I'd managed to catch prior to this one was the middling straight giallo THE FIFTH CORD (1971), starring Franco Nero (which I had recorded off late-night Italian TV); some time ago, I did get hold of his Spaghetti Western rendition of "Carmen" titled MAN, PRIDE AND VENGEANCE (1968) also with Nero and Kinski as a DivX (after I'd already missed a matinée broadcast of it) but the conversion had somehow proved faulty and, consequently, the disc wouldn't play properly! -
oOgiandujaOo_and_Eddy_Merckx4 March 2011There's no way of classifying Footprints, I know many have gone for calling it giallo, and perhaps it's best to approach it as that having never seen it, but really it's not genre fare. Much better to compare it to the likes of Solyaris, an art-house movie using genre trappings. However there's a real interbreeding of genres in Footprints, which gives it a feeling of incredible uniqueness.
It's about a woman of a certain age, Alice, who is an interpreter for a large multinational governmental body. Her whole life we feel is a masterpiece of repression, a Freudian version of Rococo filigree. A friend tells her that there is something truly inhuman about how she dedicates herself incessantly in the pursuit of perfection at a job she hates. This of course is a sign of someone for who inner dams will eventually burst. One night Alice has a strange sci-fi dream and wakes to discover that she has lost three days of her memory. A clue leads her to an unusual resort, Garma, in a country that's unspecified, but may well be that faraway country, the past. Outside of the diegesis it's actually the ancient town of Phaselis in Turkey.
The location is fascinating, there is a graveyard with unusual tombstones, an ancient church with the most magnificent glittering of golden tessera on the ceiling around a large organ. The organist, unusually, faces the audience and is glorified by their location. It's an opulent place that you can imagine was fleetingly glorious in the dying days of the Ottoman Empire as a resort, and Arcadian in the distant past. The state of the location mirrors Alice's state, a faded woman, who has only obscure memories of happiness.
The music for the movie is provided by Nicola Piovani (who worked with the Taviani Brothers), and is of the 24 carat variety. The organ and strings piece at the start is punctuated by the beating of what sounds like a heart under a stethoscope. The accompanying shots on the moon, which inevitably remind one of 2001: A Space Odyssey, are appropriately brilliant.
The beautiful stained glass peacocks of Alice's confused memory, were of interest to me. In the Western world we see these lovely creatures as ornamental and leave them wandering around the lawns of great estates. They actually come from the jungles of India however, and there's something quite outrageously beautiful present if you see them glide down the jungle valleys. Rather a metaphor for what modernity has done to the human organism.
Excellent movie, if somewhat of a diminuendo after the awe-striking first sequence. A classic of cinematic paranoia. -
ulicknormanowen7 March 2021A slow-moving film which retains a certain cult ; it seems it's all in a dream ,or a nightmare more like ; few special effects,no gore, but a great sense of mystery,with an open ending which will make all viewers interpreting the meaning of this bewildering story according to their own sensitivity .
With its deja vu feeling, its bizarre characters (Lila Kedrova) , its strange experiments on the moon , one can wonder whether the heroine is losing her mind, or is it a recurrent nightmare ? Its atmosphere sometimes recall "carnival of souls" ,probably the first important indie in the history of cinema .The beauty of Florinda Bolkan and the threatening face of Klaus Kinski add to the fascinating and deadly charm of this offbeat work. -
Bababooe3 January 2017Warning Spoilers!
This is my first review on IMDb. I have seen this movie 3 times now. First viewing was 6 months ago. 2nd and 3rd viewing last week. I have read all other reviews. Here is my assessment of the film:
Rating: 8 stars, B/B+, 10 stars given to counter-balance the lower ratings of others. Excellent acting, cinematography, music, plot/mystery.
See the movie, then see the movie again before reading the rest.
Warning Spoilers!
Alice, a translator living in Rome, develops paranoia and split personality. During her last translation session she becomes Nicole, caused by the subject matter of the translation, pollution and earth becoming uninhabitable. Alice is a woman with a few friends but no boyfriend/husband or family. She also takes some kind of pills. As Nicole she is paranoid that an organization and Professor Blackmann is after her. She goes to Garma to find her childhood lover, Harry. She changes her looks to disguise herself. There is no organization or Prof. Blackman. This is only in her mind. As Nicole, she must have found Harry and harmed his hand. We only have clues on what happened. At some point she traveled back to Rome and we are introduced to her dreaming about an astronaut being abandoned on the moon, then waking up, and finding out that she has lost 3 days. She tells her friends about the dream, referring to it as a movie she saw as a child. But we do not know if there was ever a movie or her paranoid mind made that up. The torn up post card she finds in her kitchen give a clue to her amnesia and she travels to Garma for the second time that week, this time as Alice. The people in Garma did recognize her. Harry was trying to help her. She reverts to Nicole/paranoia and kills him. She then tried to be Alice again, but finally loses it by imagining that the organization/astronauts are after her. -
dopefishie12 July 2021Beautifully shot but unsatisfying.
Well-acted. It looks fantastic! The setting and locations are incredible. The uses of lighting and color are also incredible!
However, without spoiling anything, I didn't like the ending. I wanted it all to add up to something more. -
The American title for this film, Primal Impulse, makes it sound like a bad erotic thriller from the '90s. I wish that it had been: it would probably still have been more enjoyable than the pretentious and quite unfathomable Italian twaddle that it actually is.
Also known as 'Footprints on the Moon', the film stars Florinda Bolkan as Alice, a translator who wakes to find that she can remember nothing of the past few days. Her only clues as to what has happened are a torn up postcard from the town of Garma and a mysterious yellow dress in her wardrobe. Packing her bags, she heads for Garma hoping to find the answer to the mystery.
Although almost unanimously praised here on IMDb (the film is described by most as either atmospheric, eerie, haunting or suspenseful), I found the whole thing extremely boring, a rather pointless and very slow tale in which the protagonist is probably a complete looney tune, the whole mystery being a figment of her addled imagination. Either that or she's actually part of an alien experiment masterminded by Klaus Kinski. I couldn't say for sure.
If you prefer your giallo (as this is often described) to pack a straight razor, black gloves, bloody kills and a cool score, avoid—this is not for you. If you like 'em a bit on the bizarre side (eg. Death Laid An Egg) you'll probably enjoy this a lot more than I did. -
melvelvit-115 July 2007In a bizarre experiment, an astronaut is abandoned on the moon as Alice (Florinda Bolkan), a troubled translator living in Italy, wakes from a nightmare about a lunar mission mixed with an old movie that frightened her as a child. She also has no recollection of the last three days except for a torn photo of the Garma hotel she finds in her apartment. Fired from her job, Alice heads to that resort island to try and piece together the mystery...
Considered by many to be a psychological (or "bloodless") giallo of the kind made popular by Umberto Lenzi in the late 1960s, FOOTPRINTS is actually a deliberately paced psycho-thriller with sci-fi overtones. Blurring the distinction between dream, reality, memory and movies, the disturbing story is beautifully photographed by Oscar-winner Vittorio Storaro with a pensive score by Nicola Piovani. It also combines elements of such diverse films as Armando Crispino's MACCHE SOLARI and Lucino Visconti's DEATH IN VENICE in it's depiction of alienation, isolation, hallucination, and maybe madness. Brazilian actress Florinda Bolkan, on screen all the time, does a redux of her Carol Hammond in Lucio Fulci's A LIZARD IN A WOMAN'S SKIN as Alice, a young woman thrust into a mystery that makes her question her sanity. The locations mirror Alice's unstable state of mind; the island of Garma, off-season, with it's Arabic influence and ancient ruins, is a lonely, almost mystical place unwilling to give up its secrets. Evelyn Stewart has a bit in the beginning as a concerned friend, Nicoletta Elmi and Oscar-winner Lila Kedrova are hotel guests, Peter McEnery plays a handsome biologist trying to help Bolkan, and the ever-intense Klaus Kinski is "Blackmann" in the film-within-a-film, "Footprints On The Moon".
FOOTPRINTS is a classy case of "Guaranteed 100% Euro-weird" but not for everyone. There's only one murder toward the end but you won't see it coming as the film starts to come together. -
cmoitze5 January 2011Footprints is an interesting movie. It concerns a young woman who wakes up and can't remember the previous three days. The movie subsequently follows her quest to uncover her movements of these 3 days.
This is a slow movie, but don't be put off by this. I was never once bored, my attention was held by this woman's plight and her interactions with the people around her. The characterisation was great. A wonderfully haunting music score is used, coupled with great cinematography.
This is not strictly a Giallo, more of a mystery. For fans of Italian cinema or movie fans looking for something a bit different, this comes highly recommended. -
Aaron137526 September 2012This film seems to be rated rather highly here, for me it just did not pull it all together. I was intrigued by the the film for the most part as it had me wondering the whole time, "what is exactly going on?" Unfortunately, the ending came and it needed more. A film that seems to be racing to some sort of illuminating answer, just should not end in rather confusing fashion where I was left wondering, "what are they implying happened?" The film is based off a book, so perhaps the book ends a bit less vague, but that is what made me not care for the movie as much as I might have. The too vague ending.
The story starts out with this strange scene of astronauts dragging an unconscious astronaut along the surface of the moon, there he is abandoned. Then we meet Alice who seems to be suffering from extreme memory loss. She cannot seem to remember the past couple of days clearly at all. Well she is eventually led to a town called Garma, where it seems she may have been before, and strangely she seemed to take on the persona of another person as she called herself Nicole. A little girl seems to have known her, others as well. However, the truth just is not revealed as I kept expecting some sort of conclusion, instead it ended leaving one wondering if this was all a part of some sort of delusion or if it was really happening.
Whoever made this film, I am guessing they were trying to leave things up to the viewers imagination. You could either say the lead female was crazy and that at the end her mind had totally snapped. Or, you can believe she was abducted and that she was going to be the next victim stranded on the moon. For me, the film seemed to be racing to some sort of conclusion, but the ending was inconclusive. However, for my money, I would have to say there is more evidence that she was simply crazy.
The film was not bad for me. It just was not good. I do not think it helped that it was on an alien invasion DVD which led me to believe it would have some sort of grand conspiracy at the end. I do enjoy films with towns with secrets and this one played out like a film that follows that format, it's just that the town was not really a factor in the end. It was interesting, but not entirely for me.