Writer Oliviero is an abrasive drunk who amuses himself by holding drunken orgies at his grand country manor—much to the displeasure of his long-suffering wife. But this decadence is soon rocked by a series of grisly murders, in which Oliviero finds himself implicated.

Sergio Martino’s wonderfully titled film is a loose Italian adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe’s classic short story, “The Black Cat.” This being Italian genre cinema of the 1970s, of course, it’s equal parts horror and eroticism: a lurid giallo where nearly everyone ends up nude—or dead.