I had heard positive reviews of this film before I saw it, but I was very disappointed in it. Paul Naschy stars as a troubled ex-acrobat (!) who is a prime suspect in the hunt for a killer who is murdering a string of women. Set in London, and filmed in the 1970s, the plot sees Naschy avoid capture as more and more murders happen, and the police try and catch him, and that's about as exciting as it gets. Casing itself in the giallo mould, the film tosses in a lot of "meaningful" details such as a child seeing the shoes of the stalking killer, the revelation that a different knife is used for each murders, and the fact that the killer removes selected body parts from each victim. None of which particularly enhances the plot or the big reveal at the end. There is blurb around the film saying that the killer is also a cannibal but that never surfaces in the actual plot at all.The acting is all pretty poor, most notably from the women. The victims are played by women with no acting skill at all,and there's also a really terrible non- performance by a key female character who helps Naschy in the second half of the film. Naschy himself is not bad although he appears to be wearing a very bad toupee. Actually nearly all of the female parts are played by women in bad wigs as well!The overall look of the movie is also quite poor. The print in this edition is widescreen, thankfully, but it's grubby and not very crisp. There isn't much artistry in the cinematography, many scenes are brutally lit with very harsh lighting, and a lot are overexposed. The English dub is awful, not just in the lip synching, but in the script - the lines that the characters come out with are very often hilarious. A lot of scenes are set in central London streets, and in nearly every one of them, the passers by gawp and stare directly into the camera, which totally distracts from the action, and should have been edited out. One man is even seen ducking out of the way!I don't like being negative, but this is a very dull movie. There are a lot of murders but they are all exactly the same, an amateur actress screaming and the same close up every time of a knife digging into some rubbery fake skin in extreme close up! I have seen a lot of giallos and I am a fan of the genre, but when I sit through stuff like this I realise that it takes some skill to make what are essentially crime thrillers look stylish and suspenseful, and this movie does not have that skill.

OMG could this movie be any slower? Plus, I'm not sure what century its set in. It starts in modern day London!Then there's the first murder in a bedroom that looks Victorian with an old knife!I'm confused.This is really one of the worst movies I have seen in a long time.The plotIn this version of the famous story of the London serial killer, Jack not only likes to kill prostitutes but he is a cannibal as well.

Seven Murders for Scotland Yard is pretty much your standard Giallo fare, and that is no bad thing! The plot revolves around a vicious psychopath who goes around brutally slaying prostitutes. You would expect a film with this sort of plot to be a completely brutal and sleazy affair, but Seven Murders for Scotland Yard is surprising in that aspect as while there are murders aplenty, there's no real nudity, and the murders themselves have been heavily edited, so we don't get to see much more than a bit of blood. This is unfortunate as Seven Murders for Scotland could have done with these appealing elements to compliment the plot, but even so; it has to be said that this isn't a bad film on the whole, and it's certainly one of the better Spanish Giallo's. As mentioned, the plot focuses on the murdering of prostitutes, and as the title suggests, Scotland Yard are soon on the case. The main suspects in the murders is a Peter Dockerman, whose girlfriend was killed along with the prostitutes, but Commissioner Henry Campbell of Scotland Yard doesn't believe Dockerman to be the one they're looking for.It's clear just looking at this film that it didn't benefit from a large budget, and indeed the locations do all look very cheap. Of course, the fact that my copy isn't exactly brilliant doesn't help, but it is obvious that director José Luis Madrid was merely cashing in on the popular formula of the day. Like a lot of seventies Spanish horror films, this one stars Paul Naschy. Naschy has given some good performances in the past; but this isn't one of his better ones. In fact, none of the performances in this film really inspire anything from the audience and it doesn't seem like anyone is really putting any effort in. The plot is fairly standard stuff too, though it never completely dries up as there's always another murder just around the corner. The identity of the murderer becomes obvious early on in the film, and the twist I was expecting never came. The ending itself is decent enough, however, as we finally get to see the killer's lair and the climatic struggle is decent despite the fact that you wont really care who comes out victorious. Overall, Seven Murders for Scotland Yard is a decent enough Giallo, but there are many, many better ones out there!

JACK THE MANGLER ( 1971 ) starring Paul Naschy aka SEVEN CORPSES ( MURDERS ) FOR Scotland YARD This is a very hard to see film, but is worth the hunt for fans of Naschy and also giallo knock offs. It's a decent thriller with a mysterious Jack the Ripper wanna be who kills each victim with a distinctive blade, each from a different country. One by one, prostitutes are turning up dead and missing various body parts, a set of eyes here, a heart there. One of the early victims is Naschy's whore for hire wife, and he becomes a suspect in the early investigations, despite the fact that a younger, athletic man is the type sought, and Naschy has a gimpy leg from a high wire accident that ended his circus career. The local criminal element has it in for him as well, the murders bring the cops down on them and it's hurting business. The mystery of who the killer is and why he's so eager to carve up the local tarts is decent giallo fodder and satisfied me. Orchidea de Santis provides some hotness and Andres Resino ( the boyfriend in WEREWOLF SHADOW ) does OK as a friend of the cop running the investigation. The copy I watched is from VSoM and looks like a 3rd gen dub. It's in Italian with English subs that get the job done. Sadly, it's also the covered version of the film and not the nude version that was prepared for export. The film was dubbed into English had played the US in 1976, and this presumably was the uncovered variant, but it's whereabouts are unknown. A real shame as it's up there with a lot of the Italian giallos and without the nudity, it comes off as a bit tame considering it's subject matter. Here's hoping it turns up someday, it's on the list with a few others that really need their nude versions found so these films can be properly appreciated. The plot description that mentions Jack's a cannibal this time around is bogus BTW.