This film is seriously exhausting to try and follow.

It is one helluva gory psychedelic mess.

I wasn't sure it was going to come around...and I'm not sure it ever really did.

Without providing myself a little context going into this...I would have been completely and utterly lost, as to read any meaning into it whatsoever.

It seems, a man named Dan Kristensen (Klaus Tange),has returned home to find his wife- Edwige- missing.

He starts to wander around his apartment complex, seeking help from the other residents...but they aren't of much assistance.

The residents he does happen to meet...seem to tell him their own stories...taking him on a journey through their nightmarish blood-soaked, psychedelic, fantasies.

Though, perhaps, these stories are meant to reveal something about his own, hidden, nature.

Or...is there just someone in the walls? Either way, he wakes up next to his wife's decapitated head, and thinks a man with a beard is out to kill him.

A police officer is assigned to the case, but Dan continues on with his own investigation anyways.

The man behind the wall eventually reveals himself to Dan- providing SOME sort of context for a narrative to develop: His wife was part of some game, that caused her to push the limits of her body, in an attempt to discover what was inside, but she only found "Laura". Knowing this secret tormented his wife, so she tried to escape, but was caught..."Where Laura found a new way... Where Laura keeps her secrets...".

As you can see, sh*t remains pretty cryptic.

There was an earlier point- where Dan was reading a diary that hints at the idea, that Edwige(?) had "discovered someone inside of her", that was, "trying to take control". But it's always noted in the male context.

After the man in the wall seems to have been murdered. Dan decides to break through...to see what lies on the other side.

This seems to be a journey into his own mind- during which he finally meets Laura- as he witnesses her death.

Or is she even dead? Because he soon discovers her again, and this time...the cop shoots her dead.

Now, it seems...Laura was the killer, travelling through the walls, discovered by his wife...who succumbed to her, for knowing her secret...that being, that she is also the old lady from apartment number 7.

Turns out she killed her husband- and anyone else who knew the secret of her true identity- so that she could have the man of her dreams (Dan) to herself.

But then Dan sends her off.

And sh*t is still happening.

The diary is empty. And so is the photo album- filled with stock photos.

In the end, it all seems that this was one man's bizarre, masturbatory, fantasy- possibly originating from him having witnessed his sister- Laura- have her first period, as a child.

So f*cking weird.

Beautifully shot though.

This is constructed like Lynch, and shot like Greenaway.

And it is one helluva trip.

Great film to watch on acid, for sure.

6 out of 10.

Unfortunately, I absolutely hate films that are all style over substance. I find them tedious, a chore to sit through and the polar opposite of entertaining. THE STRANGE COLOUR OF YOUR BODY'S TEARS, a tribute of sorts to the Italian gialli of the 1970s and in particular the work of Dario Argento, is one such film and something I really struggled to sit through.

The basic plot sees a husband searching for his missing wife in his apartment complex, and there's literally nothing more to it than that. The filmmakers use this as an excuse to fit together dozens of arty shots of people being sliced, stabbed and some more surreal set-pieces. There's an unpleasant sexual side to the proceedings at times while in other places it's frankly dull.

The cast is nothing to write home about but the film is indeed beautiful to look at; the camera-work is very good and sometimes stunning, but I always find the look of a film comes second to the plotting which is why I couldn't enjoy this. If these arty bits had been interspersed with a more solid narrative and some real storytelling then I might have liked this; as it stands, I hated it. Your mileage may vary.

You know that scene in Tenebre where the camera keeps flying back and forth across the roof of the apartment building that seems to break the film's narrative or the moment in Opera where the bullet explodes out of the hole in the door? Argento is the master of these set pieces yet - for a while at least - he was able to make them work within his plot instead of being style over subtance.

For anyone that wanted all the style and very little substance - is it even worth saying that a giallo story makes no sense when that feels like one of the most essential parts of the form - may I recommend the Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani (Amer, Let the Corpses Tan) film The Strange Color of Your Body's Tears. If you want a narrative film that tells a story, you will hate this will all your heart. But if you want to go on a kaliedoscopic ride, well, this one has plenty of visual horsepower.

If you need a thread to hold on to, Dan (Klaus Tange) is the protagonist, a man who comes home to find his wife missing. His journey to find her takes him through the dwellers in his apartment complex, who all have their own stories to tell.

Look, it's a gorgeous movie with a missing woman named Edwige, an awesome poster, an even better title and music from movies like All the Colors of the Dark, Torso, Eyeball, So Sweet...So Perverse, The Black Belly of the Tarantula, Short Night of Glass Dolls, Maddalena and The Violation of Emanuelle. So by all rights, I should love this. It's like watching a supercut of out there moments and feels like it would be perfect to put on at a party where people don't get offended by knives coming out of sexualized wounds (I mean, I've never been to this kind of party, but I figure they exist and people wear paper dresses and Ivan Rassimov shows up looking all sinister).

Yet it all kind of leaves me cold. The films of the past that this references, while strange to our American eyes, still had a beating heart. This feels like a cool move from set piece to set piece. And while I can't say that I didn't like it, it's not going to knock The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh or The Fifth Cord out of my blu ray player.