Shock

Shock (Schock, 1977) is Mario Bava's final feature, an Italian horror you can watch online on iFILM. Dora moves back into the seaside house she once shared with her first husband, now with a new spouse and her young son.

That first husband drowned under murky circumstances, and the place keeps tugging at her. At first it's only unease. Then the boy turns. He speaks in a voice that isn't his, slips into corners, and one day tells his mother flatly that he intends to kill her. Is Dora losing her grip, or has something in the house decided to work through the child?

Bava builds his scares with almost no budget — sound, dead silence, and whatever waits behind a half-open door. Daria Nicolodi carries the lead, while the director's son Lamberto Bava worked on the crew and would soon launch his own run of horror films. Critics tend to read it as a bridge from gothic dread to the slashers of the 1980s. Stream Shock (1977) online on iFILM.