Don't listen to the Hype. It's awful

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

While no devotee of the nunsploitation sub-genre, I am a fan of Italian horror and have also watched as many of the "Video Nasties" as I can find."Killer Nun" was ultimately a fairly disappointing experience. As a video nasty, one wonders why it was put on the list. The killings are hardly graphic and while there is nudity and sex scenes, they're not that frequent, extended, or graphic. We see boobs, a couple of shots of verdant 70s bush, and the flaccid penis of a morgue slab cadaver, but not much more. I suspect the name itself was enough to raise the ire of video store raiding bobbies; combined, perhaps, with the notion of a drug-addled, homicidal, lesbian nun! (Having typed all of that out, it almost seems like plenty of reasons to bother the censors! But really, the scenes are brief, not especially graphic or gratuitous, and few-and- far-between.)Highlights are an occasionally entertaining score by Alessandro Alessandroni, the presence of a curvaceous former Italian Playmate, Paola Morra, and some pleasantly surreal morphine hallucination scenes. Other than that, it's a pretty forgettable hour and a half; probably worth watching only by completists or die-hard fans of Italian B cinema. I've certainly seen plenty worse, but there are also many better...mind you, if lesbian drug-addicted psychotic nuns are your thing, maybe this is the one-stop film for you!

This is an interesting film about nuns and murder that was shocking in it's day, but suffers in three areas.First, it stars Anita Ekberg in her most skintastic role. No, you don't get to see her 40-23-38 body, just a brief flash of bun as she manages to get a quickie in town while she is stocking up on her drugs. Yes, she is a junkie nun and she also has a mental illness or brain disease. You never know which as everyone denies there is anything wrong with her. However, she is prone to fits of rage. Is she capable of murder? The murders starts when she returns from town. They are not particularly gruesome, and those looking for giallo will be disappointed.Finally, there is a hint of lesbianism, but those looking for full blown nunsploitation should look elsewhere. Her roommate is Italian Playboy Playmate Paola Morra, in her first film. Now, Paola does swing both ways and does give full frontal. She is definitely something to see as she is incredible beautiful, but there is no action between her and Ekberg - you just have to imagine it.The film was well directed and well written. It was an interesting work, but I feel that it will disappoint more than it will entertain.

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.

I loved this film, 'Killer Nun' (aka Suor Omicidi 1978). When I first found out about it, I knew I had to see it! This came out a year after 'Communion' (aka 'Alice, Sweet Alice') and both of these seem very similar in their approach by their directors. Both seemed to be from the same vein of film-making. European! The film is about a Nun (and a sexy one at that, played by Anita Ekberg!) who is addicted to morophine and who is losing her mind...or is she?! What's wild is that she can get away from the convent and stalk the streets for a casual sexual liason, which is one of the high-lights of the movie! She goes back to the convent and really bad things start to happen, people die....at first, they seem like 'accidents' or 'suicides', but as the film goes on, you start to see what is really happening - but I won't spoil it for others here! Just see it, rent it, buy it if you find it. The DVD is excellent. There's an interview with the director at the end and it gives insights of how they filmed this movie - inside an actual convent! And how they were able to get away with filming so many sexy scenes! There's plenty of hot sexual situations and nudity in this Euro-trash nunspoiltaion film, as well as some 'tasteful' violence! A must see for ANY Euro-horror, babe-loving film fan! I give it about a 7 1/2 out of 10! *******1/2