A quick reminder that I passively warned that I would be writing about this movie at some point.

Today it is time to address that elephant in the room that no one seems to want to address – Eary Hobte Muatine’s “Who is Touching My Thigh There is No One Else here” – the end to Giallo or even an end to a way of life? A story about loneliness, despair, anguish, supper and the never ending search for an actual afterlife. I think that, if it hadn’t been for the poor early 90s timing of the movie, things could have been different for the film but since it is filled with terrible early CGI, an abysmal dance/rap/synth score and the persisting idea that the director and producers were probably wearing soul patches on their chins, leave this thing on the lower end of good, but here at Eric Undead we always try to uncover the truth through solid and quality journalism. Right, huh, right??!

But, I think before we dive deep into this particular slice of movie history, it might be necessary to look back at Muatine’s earlier efforts that led to this. While her work seems to be missing from IMDB, we here at Eric Undead keep a much more benign and analog record of things in the Eric Undead Cabinet of Ephemera^TM and it is in there that I found an old poster I had. True story – my grandparents used to manage an apartment complex in a place called Valencia California and every now and then tenants would just up and leave and they (the apartment management company) would sell their stuff off to collectors or antiquers or just throw a bunch of shit away. I don’t remember the apartment number or anything but that was where I found a shitload of movie posters and this one is from one of her earlier American works, a campy soft romance about an American girl in England looking for stability amid the sexual revolution. As you can tell from the artwork, the movie is titled “Bras” and as you know from history, not many female youths at the time were wearing them, despite the authoritarian regimes at all levels trying to constrict women’s freedoms. Would she find love despite the storm of unrest swirling around her emancipated bosoms? Would proper society strike down her attempts to beguile aristocratic gentlemen? I’ve actually not ever been able to find or watch a copy of the print so maybe someone reading this whose seen it can either point us in the right direction or let us know how things turned out.

For those following her career, we know that in the later 70s and early 80s she made some less than remarkable love / period dramas before succumbing (?) to the desires of men across the globe and choosing to explore the more romantic arts, as they say. Despite the shielding of cutesy “Poster Armor”, her highest grossing movie to date would be her first foray into full nudity and simulated reproduction activities “Bare in Copenhagen” with the consistently tanned (and low hung) Erice Saught-Featgetes. Despite movie theaters attempting to prude up in Carter’s America, this story of two newlyweds on their honeymoon overseas. trying to make a baby in every hotel room, suite, estate, garden, port, crane and gazebo would net millions in overseas currencies and go on to produce three sequels. Naturally, returns would start to diminish with the rise of home video adult movies and possibly Saught-Featgetes’ descent into continuous abuse of Absinthe and subsequent inability to perform on set.

I remember seeing some of these stills in magazines in my grandpa’s bottom dresser drawer and they were both certainly into the glamour and positioning so it’s easy to see why these movies were so popular across the globe and – I’m not sure how they got ahold of them, but maybe through the underground here in the states. In any case, cheers to the pioneers of mainstream romance and their natural bodies, truly classics.

But as we mentioned, those films were beginning to fade and as many actors tend to do as they age, she went on to make a horror movie, capitalizing on her natural seduction and sultry eyes, the European production, trashy, early body horror called “French Lick”.

French Lick, as you’ll recall without going into its sleaze, was an early attempt at the Vagina et Daemonium micro genre except this time the concentration was not on dentata but more on the oris itself specifically the lingua. Seeing as how we are classy fuckers here at Eric Undead we won’t go into the sordid and messy details of the film and if you haven’t seen it, I’m sure you can imagine what that tongue was up to.

So now we finally reach the topic of our quality journalism here today, Muatine’s last and debatedly strangest (and saddest?) feature, the Giallo-esque “Who is Touching My Thigh? There is no one else here.”

In this she plays a woman who travels to a chalet in an unnamed mountain range where the sun rarely shines and it snows in abundance. Why anyone would go there in the first place is the real question but what do I know? When she first arrives, she naturally disrobes and takes a long steamy soapy massagey shower where all 1,500 parts get attention. I’m not really sure if the length of this scene was that necessary but on the other hand it does provide steamy nooks where – maybe! – the eye can see the eerie forms of a spectre watching her in all of her bare loveliness. Is it our eyes playing tricks on us or were the special effects that good in 1991? We can only leave it up to the viewer to decide for sure due to the tragedy but we’ll move on, in any case.

After giving herself a thorough and close up drying, she dons a slightly worn and aged bathrobe, lights the fireplace and turns to rummage in the closet. Maybe she’s looking for some pants? I don’t know but in true Giallo fashion, something pale and wispy reaches out from the depths of the closet and, that’s right, begins to stroke her right thigh. This is a still I found from one of our archives:

She recoils in terror! In a throwback to classic 70s shock, the scene becomes a still photo of primal fear as the opening (and sadly digital) score begins, lingering for what feels like several minutes

Eventually we do move past the clatter of early 1990s synthesizer clickety clicks and follow her frazzled character through the house as she tediously opens every single cabinet and drawer seemingly looking for any sign of who or what could have grabbed her. Personally I felt like this took about 20 minutes too long and should have been cut by 19 of them but no one asked me I guess so there. This all ends in the kitchen portion of the cabin or whatever it’s called, which is all stocked up for some reason so she sets about making herself dinner. Again, I don’t know what they were really going for here because the montage seems like she’s some sort of gourmet chef cooking for the Roosevelts or something when she probably just needs a ham sandwich but hey what do I know and when she finally sits down to eat, you guessed it, the one who touched her thigh is revealed at the 86 minute mark.

Her five star supper awaits! As she sits to dine, the apparition reveals himself! He is the ghost of a past chalet visitor! Unsure of how he perished, his soul is left behind to haunt these halls for eternity! Perhaps if he could couple with her as he did with others during the glory days of those 1700s Bavarian orgies, if he could mate, could he then be released from this grueling non existence? ! The torturous pain of longing and neglect? ! Yes! She cries, her loins activating! Yes! Activate! Activate!

And who can forget that tragic final sequence? Her character had succumbed to the unearthly and unbound pleasures of ethereal sex and lies still in her bed, her ghostly lover unsure of its next steps as it rises out of scene. What exactly were they trying to register here? That two souls, one encased in a human body and one in aural vestments cannot coexist together in pleasure or even life? Is the human body too frail for the urges of the spirit? Is life so fleeting as we pursue what we must, hoping to end in the arms of your deceased lover’s spirit? Or did she reach the ultimate climactic sensation to which there was no bother to return?? Are we all to be forever haunted?

It’s always been an unanswered question since the writers, producers, director and star all died in that tragic train derailment in Monaco shortly after the movie released but the gossip and social circles continue today on things like Reddit, X and honestly those are about the only social sites I know.. And while those filmmakers and, likely, Giallo died that day, we can always know that truthfully, if you feel something rubbing on your thigh and no one one else is there – you need to watch your ass.

FILED UNDER: GHOST SPERMS AND I MIGHT DO THIS AGAIN WITHOUT WARNING