Directed by Walter Strate
Written by William Mishkin
Starring:
- William Holland as Jan C. Verbig (credited as Wim Holland)
- Lili Dawn as Lili Damar
- Mitchell Kowall as Lt. Mack McCarthy (credited as Mitchell Kowal)
- Vicki Carlson as Susan Grant
- William Martel as Det. Dana
Rating: 
This pint-sized, lurid 1950s cheapie may not blow your mind, but its handful of sleazy flourishes earns it a comfy corner in the annals of exploitation cinema. As crude as it comes, this bastard child of early exploitation—dolled up as a laughably stiff cautionary tale—marks Walter Strate’s only stab at directing, and it’s daring without even knowing it. The movie’s broke, ugly, poverty-row construction makes it look like its strengths just sort of happened by mistake, but the way it retools the “sex maniac loose in New York” setup weirdly predicts what the 1960s sleaze wave would do on purpose. To the connoisseur, its sordid urban tableaux appear less canonical than curiously symptomatic—yet in its own ruinous way, it holds undeniable value.
As provocation, it crashes and burns; as crime cinema, it barely limps along. But what it does nail is its grubby, tactile portrait of New York circa 1953. The Big Apple’s back alleys and burlesque haunts look like decadent hunting grounds for perverts and dangerous traps for gorgeous models. The setup is gloriously scandalous—especially for the buttoned-up ’50s, when noir was already elbow-deep in sleaze: a killer scalping women one by one. That’s your story. The rest is clogged with windy psych-talk and drawn-out police business.
It’s mostly ragged, ugly filmmaking with hardly a pulse, but like I said—it’s bold without even trying. The raw on-location camerawork gives it a sweaty, physical sense of space that props up a story with almost no juice. Most of the cast are throwaway unknowns. Except, of course, one name that exploitation fans will clock instantly: William Mishkin, the guy who later shoved Andy Milligan’s anti-classics (and plenty of other 42nd Street grime) into the world. Violated is where he first shows up, credited as producer. In the end, it’s a scrappy little grindhouse relic, full of odd pleasures for exploitation-history buffs. If that’s not you, skip it without guilt.
