

Following a bungled robbery, three violent criminals take a young woman, a middle-aged man, and a child hostage and force them to drive them outside Rome to help them make a clean getaway.
Direction
Bava's single-location car choreography is pure cinematic sadism.
Writing
The infamous ending twist that was lost for decades.
Cinematography
Sweaty close-ups that make you smell the fear.

Director
Mario Bava
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Bava's producers hated the nihilistic ending so much they shelved the film entirely; it wasn't seen until 1998 when a producer's son found a workprint.
This is Bava's only pure crime thriller — no supernatural elements, just human monsters, making it feel eerily predictive of the 'home invasion' horror boom forty years later.