TERROR ISLAND

The two rare animal traffickers Sam and Nigel land on a private island following the shipwreck of their boat. Sam is injured and seeks help from Tess, the mysterious inhabitant of the island, who tries in every way to chase the two men away because she is grieving a recent loss. Following Sam's insistence, Tess invites the two to spend the night in her home, but Nigel rapes the woman and Sam discovers that in reality Tess is a forger of famous paintings. Intending to pocket the payment for the last painting made, the two men hold the woman hostage, but they do not suspect that Tess is not alone on the island… It must be immediately warned to the viewer that, despite the title that evokes exotic terrors and the poster that announces mutilations with a dagger, "Terror Island" is not a horror film, but a washed-out thriller/drama inexplicably sold as such. Furthermore, it must be immediately warned to the unwary viewer that this low-budget film was distributed in Italy by Enrico Pinocci Productions, the infamous Italian label that is irretrievably synonymous with poor quality. The original title of this film is the certainly less deceptive "Private Propriety", which underscores the only true theme discernible in this mess, namely the violation of property and the consequences this entails. The two dishonest protagonists of the story, in fact, due to their recklessness, find themselves involved in a seemingly manageable but completely unpredictable situation that, inevitably, leads to tragedy. From a series of interesting points that unexpectedly emerge during the course of the story, the debut director Elizabeth Dimon (who is also the screenwriter and producer of the film) fails to make anything good: the film changes direction every fifteen minutes and often ends up in the absurd or, worse still, in the involuntary ridiculous. The screenplay seems improvised during filming to the point of making it also seriously difficult to fully understand the plot, which jumps in an awkward manner from thriller to drama, to incomprehensible points of grotesque and romantic comedy that sneak in with annoyance halfway through and at the end of the film. The characters do not have clear psychologies but behave differently depending on the situation they are involved in, without the slightest coherence with what was narrated before. The actors certainly do not help to improve the situation, visibly poorly directed and not in sync with the characters they are interpreting; among them, the face of Tomas Arana can be recognized, an American character actor who has participated in countless Italian films such as "La Chiesa", "La setta", "Il maestro del terrore" and "Io e mia sorella". Dimon's direction is terribly flat and the pace becomes dangerously soporific at times, unable to keep the viewer's attention. The music is mostly inappropriate for the scenes and risks appearing mostly cloying. In short, "Terror Island" is a real plague, one of those deeply useless and inconsistent films that leave only a lot of bitterness for having wasted time watching it. Ugly without remorse.