Anita Ekberg! No stranger to playing weird and sultry blondes. In 2025 we can say that her character is so messed up. Imagine what they said in 1958, in a much saner time. Smart men see this character coming and run the other way. Alas, men are not smart. That's why they die before women. Still, it is nice to see Anita Ekberg do erotic dance routines that feature bondage, ropes, and chains. Meanwhile all around her, sultry blondes are being butchered by some maniac. Let us look at the weird Film Noir movie from 1958, "Screaming Mimi," directed by Gerd Oswald.
The sultry Virginia (Ekberg), clad in a swimsuit, leaps out of the California surf, up a hill, and into an outdoor shower. While in the shower a pervert-maniac escapee from an asylum murders her dog and goes after her with a big knife. Helpless in the shower, her stepbrother (Romney Brent) shoots the fiend to death just before the knife penetrates Virginia. This episode drives Virginia stark raving mad and into a mental asylum where she is treated by the weird Dr. Greenwood (Harry Townes). He is so enthralled with this weird, maniacal, blonde bombshell he leaves the profession and takes Virginia to the city where he will be her keeper. Great idea! Who would imaging this wouldn't work out so well? Now Virginia is Yolanda Lang and performing at The Madhouse, a nightclub featuring exotic dancing girls, run by Gypsy (Gypsy Rose Lee).
Skipping over all the lesbian suggestion going on here, it turns out a stripper named Lola Lake (Jeanne Cooper) was butchered 30 days ago. Now Bill Sweeney (Philip Carey) arrives to do a story on the new bondage dancer, Yolanda. He's enthralled but senses something is not right. Dr. Greenwood is now Bill Green, Yolanda's creepy caretaker. He has some hypnotic authority over her and is her master. Mimi? You had to ask. Screaming Mimi is a statue of a half naked dame maniacally wielding a knife and Yolanda has one. Who else had one? Lola, and now Lola is dead. Uh oh, someone is trying to kill, and almost succeeds at murdering Yolanda. Sweeney is falling in love with Yolanda and now Green and the killer are coming after him. This is all going into a very sordid place, I assure you.
Who is murdering blonde exotic dancers? Just what is this hold Green has over Yolanda? What significance is the Screaming Mimi statue in all of this? As usual, Anita Ekberg is mesmerizing and her dance numbers are pure seduction and deviance. For a prurient and breathtaking Film Noir experience, see "Screaming Mimi."
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