Notes

1. Riccardo Freda, un homme seul, Editions Yellow Now, 1993.

2. At certain points, Nightmare Castle bypasses Freda to go directly to Hitchcockian sources: an earring and a portrait, signs of the dead woman that mysteriously attract her living double, recall Vertigo; the male ingenue interrogates the heroine about her dreamworld ("Who are you?  Where is your body?") in much the same way that James Stewart's Scottie questions Kim Novak's Madeleine in Hitchcock's film.  Ennio Morricone's score occasionally recalls Bernard Herrmann's score for Psycho.

3. The shorter version censors some violence, omits a long exterior dialogue scene between Stephen and Jenny, and shortens many other scenes (frequently by chopping off their beginnings), an exercise that, while reducing the film's running time by more than fifteen minutes, paradoxically fails to speed up its pace.  I wish to thank Jeff Frentzen for providing me with a copy of the longer version.