The plot follows an unknown assailant killing female students at a college campus in Boston, who uses their body parts to make a human jigsaw puzzle.

Forty years later, after witnessing a female skateboarder smash into a mirror, a black-clad figure opens a box containing a photograph of Timmy's mother and her bloodied dress.

Arthur Brown, a reserved professor of anatomy who is often teased by students for being homosexual, gives the detectives a tour of the school, where the groundskeeper, Willard, is seen trimming hedges with a chainsaw.

Willard later arrives on the scene and is arrested as a suspect after the police find a chainsaw by the victim's body, missing her torso, at the pool.

That evening, the killer stalks a student and saws her arms off inside an elevator just before Kendall and the police arrive, then stabs Sylvia to death on a waterbed.

[10] The script for Pieces was written by American exploitation filmmaker Dick Randall and Italian producer Roberto Loyola, credited as "John Shadow".

[citation needed] A tennis coach had to be hired so that they could learn to lob the ball in a convincing enough manner to make the film believable.

[15] Billy Kelley, entertainment writer for the Fort Lauderdale News, awarded the film no stars, describing Pieces as a "gross-out extravaganza" and a "bargain basement abomination".

The movie manages to luck into that ideal combination of over-the-top bloodshed, gratuitous nudity (of both male and female types, though the latter is, as expected, the mainstage show), and unintentional absurdity for which enthusiasts of the genre are perpetually on the hunt".

[21] Bill Gibron of PopMatters wrote of the film: "Thanks to VHS and the thriving home video market, the sleazoid shocker became an instant cult classic...

It is really nothing more than your standard slasher effort with a chainsaw doing all the slice and dice (well, there are a couple of knife kills thrown in for good massacre measure)".

Mil gritos tiene la noche) appeared as a 2-disc DVD in October 2008 distributed by Grindhouse Releasing and Box Office Spectaculars.

The two-disc deluxe edition by Grindhouse includes, for the first time, an (optional) restored original soundtrack by Spanish composer Librado Pastor, as well as numerous other bonus materials.

[12] In September 2011, the British company Arrow Video released the film on DVD in a 1.66:1 anamorphic aspect ratio version with an introduction by star Jack Taylor and a number of other extras.