The Blood Stained Shadow (1978) / Walk of the Dead (1972)

First up was The Blood Stained Shadow, an entertaining 1978 giallo about murders that plague a small community in Venice.

A professor named Stefano returns to his home to visit his older brother Don Paolo, who’s a local priest. One rainy night, Paolo witnesses a woman getting strangled outside. He begins to receive threatening notes warning him to keep quiet or he’ll be next. Soon enough, someone else is murdered, so Stefano takes it upon himself to help his brother by attempting to solve the mystery. He becomes convinced that these killings are somehow tied to an unsolved murder of a young girl years ago. Stefano also starts a romance with a woman named Sandra (Stefania Casini of Suspiria) that he met on a train, as well as experience strange spells where he recalls a hidden memory of seeing something as a child. There’s also an odd painting in Sandra’s house that’s somehow tied to the killer’s identity.

The film is well done, keeping you invested with all the classic giallo elements, including a killer who wears black gloves, scenes of the killer stalking his victims, the entertaining murders, and a cast of shady characters, including a medium, a pervert, and a mid wife who performs illegal abortions, and a few good jump scares. Despite the identity of the killer being easy to figure out, it still manages to be a fun flick. Those who enjoy Italian Giallo films will find plenty to enjoy here.

The next flick was 1972’s Walk Of The Dead, a cheesy and hilarious affair starring Paul Naschy.

A greedy couple decide to break into the tomb of a dead woman to steal the expensive jewelry from her body. A shady masked character locks them in and performs a black magic ritual that reanimates the dead woman’s corpse and she kills them. Turns out this masked person is responsible for a series of murders and disappearances throughout London. A woman named Elvira, who worships a guru named Krishna, is attacked one night by a zombie woman, who also kills her father. Elvira is invited by Krishna to stay at his place on the outskirts of town, while her friend Lawrence, who works for Scotland Yard, investigates the mysterious murders and disappearances.

It turns out that the murders and reanimation of corpses is being caused by a guy named Kantanka, who is the evil brother of Krishna. He's attempting to build his army of zombie women so that he can get vengeance on the families that wronged him the past and use his black magic to achieve ultimate power. Paul Naschy plays both roles, as well as the Devil in a brief nightmare sequence. Dubbed in English, the flick is quite hilarious and offbeat, filled with over-dramatic performances, zombie women, silly proclamations of love between Elvira and Krishna, jealousy, black magic rituals, and each time there's a murder, the words SHOCK NOTICE flash across the screen to warn the audience of the blood and carnage that's about to transpire; I found this unexpectedly hilarious. All of these elements make this an enjoyable b-movie, especially for lovers of z-grade cinema. 

Both The Blood Stained Shadow and Walk Of The Dead are available to stream on Tubi. Blood Stained is the more serious of the two, while Walk is a b-movie delight. Check them out if you enjoy 70's giallo and goofy horror.