The Root of Evil (2006)

Touches You

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Andrea, a facially scarred painter suffering from amnesia, goes with her husband to live in a large, isolated country house her uncle left her after he killed himself and discovers a diary and tapes that reveal his unusual relationship with the lush greenhouse. Before you know it, Andrea's mashing up some plants and rubbing them on her face to ease the pain -otherwise, she's an elegant lady with bad hair who looks like a weird cross between Lauren Hutton and Faye Dunaway but ends up spending the entire movie behind a "Phantom Of The Opera" half-mask. To bond with the flora, Andrea starts to smoke them like pot and eventually graduates to shooting up serum made from a plant known to bring back memory. It does and she remembers it was her husband who scarred her with a boiling tea kettle (like Gloria Grahame in THE BIG HEAT) after he found out she was unfaithful. Then, for no reason at all (none that I could see, anyway), she serves her grounds keeper a spot of tea made from the leaves of a plant that drives people insane before taking his nail gun to her maid, shooting it into her ears and eyes. When Andrea's psychiatrist pays her a visit, she lops off his arms and as soon as her husband comes home from work he has to shoot the mad grounds keeper for trying to strangle Andrea who, in turn, returns the favor by beating him to death with a garden tool. She then injects herself and her blind, deaf maid with serum from a plant that makes the mind forget. The End.Not once did any of them even think of calling the police -but that's the least of it. Who on God's green earth was this made for? Did the makers really think anyone would spend good money to go see this?? I probably wouldn't be asking these questions if it was sleazy, gory Eurotrash but -and this is the biggest problem I had with it- it wasn't. Far from it -like IMAGO MORTIS, it was quite classy and restrained with all the grislier goings on going on off screen. I'm not sure but I think it was some kind of art movie and I can't believe investors (or whoever) believed enough in the project to actually give it the green light. The director was a woman, BTW, and maybe there's some feminism in there somewhere? None of the men make it to the end, either way and stay away is all I can say.

I am the first to comment this movie and i guess, it is because La Radice Del Male (The Root of Evil) is just a mediocre Italian Thriller/Horror. But probably, it is a little interesting because there are not many "gialli" anymore coming from Italy. The actors are not known, except for Zora Kerova (Cannibal Ferox, Lo Squartatore Di New York, Antropophagus and others 70/80 Italian horror movies). Unfortunately the acting is very bad and also miss Kerova is not in good formp. The begin of "La Radice Del Male" is quite original but the plot becomes too much simple too early. Also, the end of the movie is quite silly. A lost chance for an Italian horror revival? Maybe, but "La Radice Del Male" is quite entertaining anyway. I give 5 out of 10. Give it a try.