Opening with a torrential rainstorm similar to the one that begins Suspiria, Toolbox Murders is, in fact, a
fairly transparent Argento pastiche, though it plays a lot more like the English dub of one of the director's many late - career misfires than like classic Argento: the poor exposition is corny instead of poetically abstract (ditto the chasms in
logic); the big bad's motive is maddeningly
simple yet inscrutable; and the technique has minor virtues as opposed to being virtuoso.