BADass SINema Unearthed - Blu-ray 4K UHD Review

If the opening moments of Kill, Baby, Kill aren’t enough to set you on edge, then I suppose nothing else in Mario Bava’s bloody good movie will either.  Move along, kid.  There’s literally nothing for YOU to see here if you remain unaffected by its suspense.  This film, celebrated immediately upon its release, is a certifiable masterpiece of Italian cinema.

Still here?  Good.  Then you know the power of this 1966 gothic flick and that’s a damn good thing.  Because in those few minutes, Bava packs a wallop of an opening situation that will haunt this film for the rest of its all-too brief running time.

The film opens.  A panicked woman leaves a crumbling residence and, already completely upset, she dashes to higher ground.  She comes to a ledge and looks down.  A haze has set in and it spreads across her vision.  The spikes on the iron gate below look inviting and then, her fear caught in her throat, the woman tenses up before leaping to her own impalement below.  The camera doesn’t blink either.  In fact, the opening credits roll across the shot of her corpse sliding down the iron gates, bloodied and all sorts of dead.

Kill, Baby, Kill is exactly what it proclaims to be thanks to the ghost of a murderous woman who is plaguing a very superstitious town situated in the Carpathian Mountains.  Shot in about twelve days in the midlevel town of Calcata, Bava’s horror film is actually his long-awaited return to the genre.  It is both pulpy and beautiful to watch as it rolls out in a very subversive and hallucinogenic way.  The master of the macabre is in top form.

And the scene following the opening one, in which three spindly-looking men make off with a coffin via a long shot against the wide-open horizon, only solidifies the gothic creepiness inherent in this production.  It makes for a demented postcard.

Written by Romano Migliorini and Roberto Natale, the film is a wicked feast of flesh and phantasms.  We quickly learn that the town is getting a new coroner (Giacomo Rossi-Stuart) and Dr. Paul Eswai is not about to mess around with their ancient superstitions.  But, upon the discovery of a silver coin buried in a corpse’s heart, it gets really hard to deny that these villagers don’t have a point in believing that they are haunted by a ghostly girl.

And then colleagues go missing, later seen buried with a bullet in their skull, and women begin to impale themselves on nearby candelabras, due to the influence of the same ghost girl plaguing the town.  The further we sink into the movie, the more it spirals itself into our skull.   Kill, Baby, Kill is a mesmerizing mystery surrounded by the fog of a gothic narrative about a small girl and

Kill, Baby, Kill is as wicked as it sounds.  And its mystery will linger with you for days on end.

For a lot of Horror Hounds, Mario Bava’s Kill, Baby, Kill! is where their journey into the dark begins, making this release a MUST OWN.  It is now a part of Shout Factory’s The Mario Bava Collection.

Shout Factory Exclusive / Limited Deluxe Edition / Blu-ray - 2,500 copies

Home Video Distributor: Shout Factory
Available on Blu-ray - July 31, 2025
Screen Formats: 1.66:1
Subtitles: English SDH
Video: MPEG-4 AVC
Audio: English DTS-HD Master Audio Mono
Discs: Blu-ray Disc; Twelve-disc set
Region Encoding: blu-ray locked to Region A

In the beginning of the Twentieth Century, the Dr. Eswai is called by Inspector Kruger to a small village to perform an autopsy on a woman who has died under suspicious circumstances. Despite help from Ruth, the village witch, Kruger is killed and it is revealed that the dead woman, as well as other villagers, have been killed by the ghost of Melissa, a young girl who, fed by the hatred of her grieving mother, Baroness Graps, exacts her revenge on them. Dr. Eswai, along with Monica, a local nurse, are lured into a fateful confrontation at the Villa Graps....

VIDEO

The film is presented with a 1080p/AVC-encoded transfer using an aspect ratio of 1.66:1.  The ambitious scale of Bava's atmospherics is represented in absorbing style with an image that is surprisingly clean given the age of the film, without any over-processing lending the picture an artificial appearance.  Certainly, despite the clarity of the presentation, the film is still allowed to breathe and retains a level of grain that ensures an authentic and credible appearance.  Even dark scenes are rarely problematic, with the blacks proving extremely solid, and the level of accuracy ensuring that this gothic masterpiece is visually absorbing throughout.

AUDIO

The audio is presented in a solid English DTS-HD Master Audio English With English SDH Subtitles.

Supplements:

Commentary:

• There are several.  See the breakdown below!

Special Features:

Set in modern day Transylvania, this creeping terror of a film follows an evil curse that has befallen a village plagued by bizarre murders. A doctor, investigating a young woman's apparent suicide, discovers the locals believe that the ghost of a baron's daughter is responsible. The victims in the small village are found dead with gold coins planted in their hearts. Director Mario Bava's chiller stars Giacomo Rossi Stuart and Erika Blanc. This moody and stylish film, filled with disturbing sequences, is one of Bava's best.

KILL, BABY... KILL! (1.85:1, 83 MINUTES):

• NEW Audio Commentary With Film Critic Meagan Navarro
• NEW Audio Commentary With Journalist Scott Neumyer
• Image Gallery
• International Trailer
• TV Spots

	Movie
	Video
	Audio
	Extras
Composite 4K UHD Grade

Kill, Baby, Kill (1966)

MPAA Rating: GP.
Runtime: 83 mins
Director: Mario Bava
Writer: Romano Migliorini
Cast: Giacomo Rossi Stuart; Erika Blanc; Fabienne Dali
Genre: Horror
Tagline: The night brings terror! Blood chilling fear!
Memorable Movie Quote: "The child has seen her. She's after our daughter and now there's no help for her!"
Theatrical Distributor: American International Pictures
Official Site: https://shoutfactory.com/products/the-mario-bava-collection-limited-deluxe-edition#
Release Date: October 8, 1967
DVD/Blu-ray Release Date: July 31, 2025
Synopsis: A Carpathian village is haunted by the murderous ghost of a little girl, prompting a coroner and a medical student to uncover her secrets while a witch attempts to protect the villagers.