THE HOUSE WITH LAUGHING WINDOWS– 50 Years of Pupi Avati’s Italian Horror Masterpiece

THE HOUSE WITH LAUGHING WINDOWS (1976) d. Pupi Avati (Italy)

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Pupi Avati’s The House with Laughing Windows (1976) is one of the most quietly unsettling films in the history of Italian horror, a slow-burn nightmare that lingers long after its final moments. Set in the foggy, insular villages of rural Emilia-Romagna, the film follows Stefano, a young restorer hired to repair a disturbing fresco depicting the martyrdom of Saint Sebastian. As Stefano settles into the community, he begins to sense that the artwork - and the people surrounding it - are tied to something deeply wrong.

THE HOUSE WITH LAUGHING WINDOWS (1976) Movie Review

The House with Laughing Windows (1976) d. Pupi Avati (Italy) (110 min)

Art historian and restoration specialist Stefano (Lino Capolicchio) is summoned to a rural Italian town to restore a grotesque fresco (grotesquo?) depicting the death of St. Sebastian, shown in horrible torment with daggers skewering his naked body. When his friend Antonio (Giulio Pizzirani), who recommended him for the job, is found dead on the cobblestones outside his apartment, the police quickly deem it a suicide, ignoring Stefano’s claims that a shadowy figure was lurking on the balcony above. Through encounters with the town’s bizarre locals, Stefano learns more about the mystery surrounding the fresco’s artist, Legnani, dubbed the “Painter of Agony,” as well as Legnani’s equally twisted sisters who helped him procure unwilling subjects and torture them while he captured their anguished expressions on canvas.