Maidgethma Wonderfully offbeat film!

CommentsXp Best movie ever!

WillSushyMedia This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

Gurlyndrobb While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

chuckchuck21 This show gets great hype from its being banned when it was released & it does cover murder, drugs, self-flagellation & lesbian sex. Since it's based on actual events the ban had more to do with "leave the church alone". This is way pre-altar boy trouble.Anita Ekberg & Paola Morra are the attractions here & the story line is just strong enough to carry the show when they are not on screen. A somewhat eerie feeling to this show. If a hint of blasphemy upsets you avoid this like the plague.If you like Anita Ekberg unclothed this is for you. PS: Paola is better looking than Anita but there is less flesh than you might think. Blasphemy was the reason for the ban. Joe Dallesandro stars here too. Check him out in Blood for Dracula & also in Flesh for Frankenstein along with a cast of nude cuties.

Scott LeBrun Swedish sex symbol Anita Ekberg plays Sister Gertrude, a veteran nun / nurse who is starting to lose her grip on reality. After she herself has been the subject of an operation, she has become a morphine addict, and she also goes about experiencing sexual satisfaction with a stranger. She even begins to take delight in being cruel to the patients in her care, with one memorable scene of dentures smashing. And to top it all off, the patients are now either having "accidents" or getting killed. Could Sister Gertrude be the one responsible?Full of striking imagery, director Giulio Berruti's sleazy and sexy combination of the Giallo and Nunsploitation genres is deliberately paced and very well acted by some of its cast. The co- stars include Paola Morra as the enticing young Sister Mathieu; the delectable Ms. Morra delivers a fine performance and does some full frontal nudity. Alida Valli ("Suspiria") plays the Mother Superior, Massimo Serato ("Don't Look Now") is the dedicated Dr. Poirret, Lou Castel ("The American Friend") is the cynical Peter, and Andy Warhol film graduate Joe Dallesandro, wooden as always, is Patrick Rowlands, the young man who replaces Poirret as the doctor.It's not exactly hard to figure out where all of this is going, but getting there is still reasonably fun. Supposedly "based on actual events that occurred in a central European country not that long ago", it works on the level of good trash, with a fair bit of gore, the aforementioned nudity, and an overall sense of surrealism. Standout sequences include the torture of one poor patient (it's guaranteed to make some viewers wince) and the struggle of the crippled Peter to make it up some stairs without the use of his crutches.People who enjoy Italian sleaze pictures will likely have a good enough time with this one.Seven out of 10.

ferbs54 Sister Gertrude, in the 1978 Italian horror film "The Killer Nun," is certainly not your typical, garden-variety nun. Addicted to mainlining morphine (Sister Morphine?!?!) as a result of a recent brain tumor operation, she also smokes cigarettes, drinks liquor in bars, hallucinates, has up-against-the-wall sex with casually picked-up men, wears makeup, steals, engages in domineering lesbian sex with her roommate, and, perhaps most shocking of all, refers to her Mother Superior as "bitch." Still...does that mean she's responsible for the wave of recent murders in the French hospital where she works? What would YOU think? As played by Miss Sweden 1951 herself, Anita Ekberg, Gertrude really is a sight to behold, both in and out of the, er, habit. Sadly, this picture, though great sounding in synopsis, is a real mixed bag, never dishes out quite enough in the sex and violence departments, and will probably leave most viewers wanting more in terms of sleaze, shocks and scares. Still, there are some pleasures to be had here. Giulio Berruti's directing is occasionally quite stylish, and the film's score, by Alessandro Alessandroni, is freaky (especially during Gertrude's "shooting sprees") and really quite excellent. Film buffs will also be happy to see Alida Valli and Joe Dallesandro in small roles, and one of the film's murders, featuring multiple hypodermic needles in an old woman's face, should satisfy all the gorehounds out there. The DVD that I just watched, from the good folks at Blue Underground, looks fine but has been poorly dubbed; subtitles would have been infinitely preferable. I had to watch the film twice to make sure I understood the ending correctly--the hushed, fast-talking dubbing doesn't always make things easy--and, if I may make a, um, confession, did appreciate it more the second time around.

missmonochrome Many of my fellow reviewers seem to have very poor opinions of this film, but "Killer Nun" does deserve a second look.What plot there is (loosely based on actual events) concerns Sister Gertrude (a still luscious Anita Ekberg), who was once a respected nun, but is spiraling into madness due to a post brain surgery addiction to morphine.Before long she's abusing her patients, neglecting her duties, seducing her young room mate Sister Mathieu (Paola Morris)and turning a host of ordinary objects (lamp bases, needles, wads of cotton) into implements of death for anyone who dares stand in her way, while stealing their stuff to support her habit.As an added bad taste bonus, we also get Sister Gertrude having anonymous sex in an alleyway and admitting a fetish for humiliation and silk stockings during Sapphic trysts.Unlike most other nunsploitation fare, this movie isn't as explicit as it could be (on the interview on Blue Underground's recent DVD this was revealed as a gesture of respect from director to his star), but it doesn't suffer too much for it, as there is plenty of suggestive and evocative imagery.Ekberg doesn't show much of her famous curves, but nails a cruel seductress hauteur that does plenty to suggest what the character is capable of. Wheather surveying the residents for her next victim or prowling a café for a sexual conquest, there's something distinctly predatory behind those blue eyes, like a hungry cat looking for something small and helpless to torture.Her drug mania scenes are also beautifully shot, with visual references both psychedelic and sacrilegious. Several scenes use sly visual references to Catholic Mass as a way of indirectly connecting religious ecstasy and the more base and carnal kind.There's even a nice, (if somewhat predictable) "twist" ending.All in all, "Killer Nun" is a stylish slice of delightfully trashy exploitation, worth the hour and a half of your time and 7 stars.