About

A film of sweat and savagery, Rabid Dogs is arguably Mario Bava's final masterpiece. The horrors contained here do not come from supernatural forces but instead the abject amorality of its characters, revealing a black void at the heart of civilisation.

The film follows three criminals who find themselves on the run after a disastrous robbery turns deadly. Taking a young woman hostage, they force their way into the car of a father on his way to the hospital with his ill child. What remains is a white-knuckle journey in which the loathsome crooks and their hostages sweat through the overbearing heat as tensions rise in unpredictable ways.

The action of Rabid Dogs rolls out almost in real time, with audiences given no reprieve from the boiling tension on display. Bava may have been towards the end of his career by the mid-1970s, but this is a forward-looking film with a down-and-dirty approach to its construction, sharing similarities with neo-realist triumphs like Salvatore Giuliano 1962 and the muddied ethics of New Hollywood crime flicks.

Ages 18+