Director
Carlo Lizzani left behind his typically political interests in favor of pure sex and violence in this convoluted thriller. A married woman selling the title carpet, which a Persian legend holds to be yellow only to highlight the color of blood, is visited by an older man while her husband is out. What follows is a labyrinthine tangle of incestuous urges, poisonings, psychosexual sadism, drug abuse, and torture. Despite having been filmed for television, this bizarre film -- based on a play by Aldo Selleri -- is quite graphic. Perverse sexual situations and knifepoint torture abound, while at one point a syringe is stabbed into an eyelid in close-up.
Erland Josephson, Beatrice Romand,
Vittorio Mezzogiorno, and
Milena Vukotic lead the talented cast. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide