The Visitor by Giulio Paradisi (1979)
I’m pretty sure The Visitor has been lodged in my subconscious ever since I glimpsed its VHS cover on the video store racks back in grade school. This bizarre Italian film about an alien warrior tracking down a psychic-powered eight-year-old girl who might be the spawn of Satan isn’t exactly coherent. Still, I was never not fascinated by its weird juxtaposition of the ominous and mundane through a trippy score, some also-trippy visual effects, and an uncanny ability to create an otherworldly atmosphere in spite of the melodramatic acting and ham-fisted dialog. Part of me would love to see a modern remake — the film certainly has plenty of intriguing elements (e.g., otherworldly warriors, psychic children, Satanic secret societies) — but you’d lose something without the genuine ’70s aesthetic, most notably the architecture of Atlanta’s now-demolished Omni Coliseum.
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