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The lady enters from the back as a glittering fashion-accessory à la Marnie, as befits this jazzy welter of Hitchcockisms. (Her fate is Marion Crane's, Suspicion colors the last act.) Sergio Martino works swiftly, the illicit lovemaking of the bored socialite (Ida Galli) is intercut with the airplane carrying her husband until it explodes mid-air. From London to Athens for the young widow, a cool million and a black-gloved killer and a darkened theater "fit for farce or tragedy" (cf. Argento's Four Flies on Grey Velvet). The late tycoon's mistress (Janine Reynaud) wants the inheritance for herself, the insurance agent (George Hilton) cannot save the heroine from getting carved up in her hotel room, the foxy photographer (Anita Strindberg) takes over as fashion plate and murderer-magnet. "Remember Plato?" The Il Conformista connection is made by the irritable police commissioner, the hero quotes Balzac at the moment of the unmasking. Subtle vortexes in a precise construction, the Martino specialty in ample supply. Giallo painting with arterial sprays on window panes, green and crimson filters once the lights are out and a blade is loose. An overhead camera swinging from speaker to speaker across the widescreen turns a chunk of exposition into a witty little tour de force, a rooftop chase includes a stop at a cabin stocked with pop-eyed dolls. America through the Euro-sleaze gaze, "that land of make-believe and contradiction," serves as backdrop for show-stopping slaughter, parades on a flickering television screen while the culprit applies a broken bottle to the mug of a witness. "Well, even a sex maniac must pay his laundry bill." A composition of harpoon and Mediterranean rock pleasingly resolves the intrigue. With Alberto de Mendoza, Luigi Pistilli, Tom Felleghy, and Luis Barboo.
--- Fernando F. Croce |