Joan (Elvire Audray) dreams of an Etruscan ritual where the sacrificial victims have their necks broken and their heads twisted completely around. The next day in Volterra, her husband Arthur (John Saxon) discovers the tomb from her dream. While talking to Joan long distance (she's in New York), he is murdered in the same manner after telling her that he will not ship some crates unless her father sends him a telex with money to excavate the tomb. Not content with her father's (Van Johnson) reports, Joan flies to Italy with Mike (Paolo Malco), who was doing research for Arthur. They discover Arthur was a guest of the Countess Maria Valumna (Marilu Tolo) and he was murdered at her villa (which some might recognize from SLAUGHTER HOTEL and the end of THE GIRL IN ROOM 2A). Her father's associate Heather (Wandisa Guida) tries to downplay any suspicions Joan has which isn't easy when Joan has more visions and one of their guards is murdered in the same manner as Arthur. Joan discovers that Arthur had a jeweler make a chain for a two-tailed scorpion amulet which she recognizes from the dream. When Joan's father turns up in Italy, it turns out that he and the countess are involved in the drug trade and that cocaine was supposed to be shipped with crates of archaeological artifacts. They pressure Joan into leading them to the tomb where they believe the crates are hidden. En route they are shot at by a motorcyclist who turns out to be Heather who also ends up with her head twisted around when she gets to the tomb before them. There is another shootout at the tomb where a possessed Joan calls upon the Etruscan gods to strike down the desecrators of the tomb which causes a cave-in with Joan the only survivor. After recovering from a bullet wound, Joan and Mike visit the tomb which is being excavated by the Italians including Paolo (Claudio Cassinelli) who shows Joan an Etruscan fresco which she resembles (albeit with black hair) wearing the same two-tailed scorpion necklace she is wearing.

The plot is incredibly crowded and there seems to be a cliffhanger every few minutes but that is likely due to the fact that the film was shot as a 3+ hour miniseries and then whittled down to 97 minutes. The intended TV medium also explains the lack of nudity and gore (although make-up artist Franco Ruffini [CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD] does manage a grisly maggot-under-the-eyelid-of-a-corpse shot) and the abandonment of scope framing common to most of director Sergio Martino's seventies output (the eighties saw a turn in Luciano Martino's Dania Film away from features to TV movies and miniseries as well as some bland-looking feature films that looked like they were shot for TV) but Martino's regular cinematographer Giancarlo Ferrando manages some attractive landscapes and the Etruscan tomb sequences are beautifully framed and lit. Fulci composer Fabio Frizzi provides an atmospheric score that leans towards the romantic and adventure aspects (which may explain why some of his score was replaced with tracks from his score for Fulci's CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD). Audray makes for a glamorous protagonist with her big blonde hair and fur coats but also looks quite convincing in her Etruscan flashbacks. Tolo is also quite glamorous here (she also played another mysterious countess around the same time in the Irish/Swedish Le Fanu adaptation SLEEP OF DEATH) and may be dubbing her own English-language performance. Malco and Cassinelli aren't given much to do as the heroic duties are divided between them with one taking up where the other left off. Familiar face Franco Garafolo (HELL OF THE LIVING DEAD) plays a fashion photographer whose photographs might have captured the killer at one of the crime scenes. The film's English dubbing cast is also full of familiar Euro cult voices. The film is in the minority of Italian horror films that treat the Etruscan afterlife in a reverential manner (in contrast to THE DEAD ARE ALIVE and BURIAL GROUND).