# Don't Torture a Duckling
**Don't Torture a Duckling** (Italian: *Non si sevizia un paperino*) is a 1972 Italian giallo (Italian thriller-horror genre with mystery, stylized violence, and murder investigations) thriller directed by [Lucio Fulci](https://www.edgepedia.org/lucio-fulci), in which a series of child murders in a remote southern Italian village drives the townspeople toward superstition, false accusation, and mob violence while a reporter investigates the real killer.[1](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/index.php/scheda.html?codice=AG3321) The film was written by Fulci with Roberto Gianviti and Gianfranco Clerici, produced by Medusa Distribuzione, and stars Florinda Bolkan, Barbara Bouchet, Tomas Milian, Irene Papas, and Marc Porel.[1](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/index.php/scheda.html?codice=AG3321) It drew censorship problems in Italy on release and later became a cult favorite, particularly in the United States.[2](https://www.torinofilmfest.org/it/20-torino-film-festival/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/5994/)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Original title | *Non si sevizia un paperino*; the indefinite article "un" was added after Disney objected to the use of Donald Duck's name in the working title *Non si sevizia Paperino*[3](https://www.rapportoconfidenziale.org/?p=6469) |
| Director and writers | Lucio Fulci; story by Fulci and Roberto Gianviti, screenplay by Fulci, Gianviti, and Gianfranco Clerici[1](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/index.php/scheda.html?codice=AG3321) |
| Principal cast | Florinda Bolkan (Maciara), Barbara Bouchet (Patrizia), Tomas Milian (Andrea Martelli), Irene Papas, Marc Porel (don Alberto Avallone)[4](https://ilcinemaritrovato.it/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/) |
| Key crew | Cinematography Sergio D'Offizi, music Riz Ortolani, editing Ornella Micheli[1](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/index.php/scheda.html?codice=AG3321) |
| Italian release | Censorship visa 61046 dated 22 September 1972; initially prohibited to viewers under 18, reduced to 14 on the second edition after cuts[5](https://cinecensura.com/feature-films-en/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino-dont-torture-donald-duck/) |
| Running time | Reported as 102 minutes by the Torino Film Festival,[2](https://www.torinofilmfest.org/it/20-torino-film-festival/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/5994/) 105 minutes by Il Cinema Ritrovato,[4](https://ilcinemaritrovato.it/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/) and 110 minutes by the International Film Festival Rotterdam[6](https://iffr.com/en/iffr/1998/films/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino) |
| Critical standing | 88% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer from 8 reviews; 77% on the audience Popcornmeter from more than 1,000 ratings[7](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/dont_torture_a_duckling) |
## Spoilers
### Plot and themes
The story is set in Accendurra, a mountain village in southern Italy, where several young boys are murdered in quick succession by the same cruel, apparently inexplicable method.[6](https://iffr.com/en/iffr/1998/films/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino) • [1](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/index.php/scheda.html?codice=AG3321) Suspicion falls in turn on the village's outcasts, and public opinion settles on Maciara (Florinda Bolkan), a young woman versed in magic arts. She is segregated, tortured, and the village prepares to lynch her.[1](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/index.php/scheda.html?codice=AG3321) The decisive investigation is carried out by Andrea Martelli (Tomas Milian), a journalist from the north who looks past the prejudices and conventions that lead the population to lynch a poor, simple-minded woman in a sequence that has become celebrated.[2](https://www.torinofilmfest.org/it/20-torino-film-festival/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/5994/) The killer is eventually discovered, and the film's synopsis notes that the truth is more shocking than the crimes themselves.[1](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/index.php/scheda.html?codice=AG3321) • [8](https://tv.apple.com/us/movie/dont-torture-a-duckling/umc.cmc.6pn1oo3qu8xiybfxq5744s122) Critics writing about the film have identified the killer as a priest, an anti-clerical choice that was radical for an Italian film of 1972.[9](https://mubi.com/en/films/dont-torture-a-duckling/critics-reviews)
The film's target is the community rather than a single murderer. The [Rotterdam](https://www.edgepedia.org/rotterdam) festival synopsis describes it as focused on an obsessive religious delusion that, combined with ignorance, propels the plot toward a lynching, and notes that southern Italy was for the first time portrayed as a setting where natural beauty and a thousand years of tradition form the background not to noble poverty but to evil.[6](https://iffr.com/en/iffr/1998/films/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino) The Bologna festival's note adds that magic and religiosity appear indistinguishable, and that the pessimistic picture of an Italy of irreducible superstitions angered both Catholic critics and the censors.[4](https://ilcinemaritrovato.it/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/) Reviewers have also read the film as a critique of small-town hypocrisy, religious influence, social exclusion, and media sensationalism.[10](https://www.avforums.com/reviews/dont-torture-duckling-4k-blu-ray-review.22575/)
## Production
Lucio Fulci (Rome 1927 to 1996) began as an assistant director and screenwriter, debuted as a director in 1959 with *I ladri*, and worked across comedy, westerns, and thrillers before international fame came with *Zombi 2* in 1979.[2](https://www.torinofilmfest.org/it/20-torino-film-festival/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/5994/) *Don't Torture a Duckling* was the first film produced by the Medusa film company.[11](https://www.apuliafilmcommission.it/21-non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/) Festival sources credit the production to Edmondo Amati for Medusa Distribuzione,[4](https://ilcinemaritrovato.it/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/) while the Torino Film Festival credits Agostino Pane as producer.[2](https://www.torinofilmfest.org/it/20-torino-film-festival/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/5994/)
The film was shot on location at Monte Sant'Angelo in the province of Foggia, Apulia, a Gargano town that suited the story's world of superstition; the end credits do not even name the location.[11](https://www.apuliafilmcommission.it/21-non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/) The EOFFTV production listing records 35mm Technicolor Techniscope photography in a 2.35:1 ratio, with locations credited to Monte Sant'Angelo, Foggia, Apulia, and notes the production thanked the local carabinieri headquarters for their cooperation.[12](https://eofftv.com/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino-1972/) Riz Ortolani composed the score, and the song "Quei giorni insieme a te", by Ortolani and Fiastri, is sung by Ornella Vanoni; it plays over the lynching of Maciara, a sequence that has long appeared in horror-film handbooks.[3](https://www.rapportoconfidenziale.org/?p=6469) • [4](https://ilcinemaritrovato.it/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/)
The title itself has a production history. Fulci's original title, *Non si sevizia Paperino*, used the Italian name of [Donald Duck](https://www.edgepedia.org/donald-duck), and Disney contested the use of its character's name, imposing the indefinite article. Medusa circumvented the effect by printing the word "un" in a lighter color in the promotional fotobuste, making it less immediately visible.[3](https://www.rapportoconfidenziale.org/?p=6469)
## Censorship and reception
[The Italian](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-italian) censorship board required a cut of a nude scene but endorsed public screening provided it was prohibited to minors under 18, citing "numerous scenes of terrifying violence and horrifying realism"; on the second edition, after many changes to the most upsetting scenes, the age limit was reduced to 14 years.[5](https://cinecensura.com/feature-films-en/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino-dont-torture-donald-duck/) The Bologna festival note records that the cuts were only laboriously restored in later years.[4](https://ilcinemaritrovato.it/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/) The Torino Film Festival describes the film as long invisible except in a version tamed for television, and as a cult object above all in the United States, where the blending of genre with Italy's political and social tensions of the period is appreciated.[2](https://www.torinofilmfest.org/it/20-torino-film-festival/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/5994/)
Contemporary critical standing is strong. On Rotten Tomatoes the film holds 88% from 8 critics and 77% from more than 1,000 audience ratings.[7](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/dont_torture_a_duckling) Budd Wilkins, writing in *Slant Magazine* in 2025, called it a haunting examination of guilt, innocence, and repression.[7](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/dont_torture_a_duckling) Maitland McDonagh has compared it to *The Wicker Man* of Italian exploitation cinema, a deconstruction of urban illusions about idyllic country life.[7](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/dont_torture_a_duckling) Reviewers note that the film largely lacks the notorious splatter effects of Fulci's later horror work: the child murders are often off-screen, and the graphic violence is reserved mainly for the deaths of the witch and the killer.[10](https://www.avforums.com/reviews/dont-torture-duckling-4k-blu-ray-review.22575/) • [7](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/dont_torture_a_duckling) [The A.V. Club](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-a-v-club), reviewing a 2013 home-video release, called it an uneven but memorable addition to the giallo canon, noting that it fulfills the genre's requirements, an investigator, a rampaging psychopath, killer's-POV murder scenes, while adding a vividly realized small-town backdrop and a sense of moral outrage.[13](https://www.avclub.com/don-t-torture-a-duckling-is-an-uneven-but-memorable-add-1798238665)
## Restoration and home video
The film has been restored twice for home video. A picture restoration was completed in 2015 by TLEFilms Film Restoration and Preservation Services of Germany, working from a digital scan of the Eastman original camera negative, with color re-timing matched to the [Technicolor](https://www.edgepedia.org/technicolor) prints, and sound restored by Artmanix Media; the re-editing removed the redundant "handles" of the Techniscope process to match Fulci's original cut.[14](https://s1.thcdn.com/design-assets/documents/arrowfilms/Don%27t%20Torture%20a%20Duckling.pdf) A new 4K restoration was carried out in 2024 by Arrow Films at the laboratories L'Immagine Ritrovata and Dragon Studios, starting from the original 35mm Techniscope negative and the optical sound negative; the restored version screened at Il Cinema Ritrovato in Bologna in 2025.[4](https://ilcinemaritrovato.it/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/) Arrow Video's 2025 limited-edition 4K UHD release presents the film at its original 2.35:1 ratio with HDR10 and [Dolby Vision](https://www.edgepedia.org/dolby-vision) grading passes, Italian and English LPCM mono tracks, and supplements including a new interview with [Barbara Bouchet](https://www.edgepedia.org/barbara-bouchet) and legacy interviews with Florinda Bolkan, cinematographer Sergio D'Offizi, and editor Bruno Micheli.[10](https://www.avforums.com/reviews/dont-torture-duckling-4k-blu-ray-review.22575/)
## References
1. [Non si sevizia un paperino (1972), Archivio del Cinema Italiano](https://www.archiviodelcinemaitaliano.it/index.php/scheda.html?codice=AG3321)
2. [Non si sevizia un paperino, Torino Film Festival](https://www.torinofilmfest.org/it/20-torino-film-festival/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/5994/)
3. [Non si sevizia un paperino > Lucio Fulci, Rapporto Confidenziale](https://www.rapportoconfidenziale.org/?p=6469)
4. [Non si sevizia un paperino, Il Cinema Ritrovato](https://ilcinemaritrovato.it/film/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/)
5. [Non si sevizia un paperino (Don't Torture Donald Duck), Cinecensura](https://cinecensura.com/feature-films-en/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino-dont-torture-donald-duck/)
6. [Non si sevizia un paperino, International Film Festival Rotterdam 1998](https://iffr.com/en/iffr/1998/films/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino)
7. [Don't Torture a Duckling, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/dont_torture_a_duckling)
8. [Don't Torture a Duckling, Apple TV](https://tv.apple.com/us/movie/dont-torture-a-duckling/umc.cmc.6pn1oo3qu8xiybfxq5744s122)
9. [Don't Torture a Duckling critic reviews, MUBI](https://mubi.com/en/films/dont-torture-a-duckling/critics-reviews)
10. [Don't Torture a Duckling 4K Blu-ray Review, AVForums](https://www.avforums.com/reviews/dont-torture-duckling-4k-blu-ray-review.22575/)
11. [21 – Non si sevizia un paperino, Apulia Film Commission](https://www.apuliafilmcommission.it/21-non-si-sevizia-un-paperino/)
12. [Non si sevizia un paperino (1972), EOFFTV](https://eofftv.com/non-si-sevizia-un-paperino-1972/)
13. [Don't Torture A Duckling is an uneven but memorable addition to the giallo canon, The A.V. Club](https://www.avclub.com/don-t-torture-a-duckling-is-an-uneven-but-memorable-add-1798238665)
14. [Don't Torture a Duckling restoration notes, Arrow Films](https://s1.thcdn.com/design-assets/documents/arrowfilms/Don%27t%20Torture%20a%20Duckling.pdf)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Horror films (individual works) › Exploitation and extreme horror films*
*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
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