Deep Red
A musician witnesses the aftermath of a psychic's murder and becomes obsessed with solving the crime. As he follows a trail of visual clues and traumatic memories, the case unfolds into one of Dario Argento's most stylish and influential gialli.
Film details
| Original / alt title | Profondo rosso; Deep Red; The Hatchet Murders |
| Year | 1975 |
| Director | Dario Argento |
| Country | Italy |
| Runtime | Approx. 126 min (Italian cut) |
| Main cast | David Hemmings, Daria Nicolodi, Gabriele Lavia |
UK status
An important censorship-era horror classic, but not one of the DPP 72 titles.
Now widely available in the UK and celebrated as one of Argento's signature films.
Why it caused controversy
UK censorship / Video Nasties history
A quick status check first, followed by the film’s censorship timeline. A DPP prosecution was an obscenity case against a particular video publication — it was not automatically the same thing as a permanent nationwide “ban”.
Detailed censorship timeline & facts
FACTS & TRIVIA
- The score was created by Goblin, with additional music involvement from Giorgio Gaslini.
- Daria Nicolodi co-wrote the story idea and co-stars in the film.
- It helped define the modern giallo template for colour, camera movement and elaborate murder mystery plotting.
- Many fans regard it as Argento's finest film.
- Its UK history was complicated by shortened export and dubbed versions.
- The title on your uploaded artwork reflects its cult-video afterlife rather than the original Italian poster design.
- It had a huge influence on later slasher and mystery-horror films.
Distributor / VHS label
Archive cover shown is the user-supplied scan. UK distributor / VHS-label attribution varies by edition and is not asserted here without a verified sleeve imprint.
Trailer
Open a search for the original theatrical / VHS-era trailer. This keeps the archive linking to publicly available trailer sources rather than hosting copyrighted film footage.
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