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Giallo
Italy 1934
produced by Societa Anonima Stefano Pittaluga, Società Italiana Cines
directed by Mario Camerini
starring Assia Noris, Sandro Ruffini, Elio Steiner, Giulio Gemmò, Carlo Ranieri, Aronne Limardi, Carlo Lombardi, Vanda Barbini, Luigi Erminio D'Olivo
screenplay by Mario Soldati, Mario Camerini, based on the play The Man Who Changed His Name by Edgar Wallace, music by Guido Albanese
review by Mike Haberfelner
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Henriette (Assia Noris), a city girl, is bored to death with her
husband Giorgio (Sandro Ruffini), a rich farmer for whom farming is
everything and who has no sense for adventure. So she goes on trips to the
city on her own ever so often, just to live a little. On one such trip,
she notices a stranger trying to break into her hotel room - but
fortunately, the guest next door, Count Amati (Elio Steiner), comes to her
rescue - thing is, the intruder and Amati are actually the same man, it
was just a ruse on his behalf to win her attention. She's though unaware
of that ruse, and falls for him hook, line and sinker. The next day back
at Giorgio's farm, she stumbles upon Amati again - as it turns out that he
wants to buy some land from Giorgio, something she has so far opposed, but
she's now happy to overthink her position. As it happens, Giorgio is
called away for an urgent call, and Amati is more than eager to sign the
contract without delay - as silver has been found on the land in question,
and naturally Amati wants to seal the deal before Giorgio learns of this
fact, which of course is actually what above call is about. Anyways, so
while Giorgio is out, Henriette helps Amati in the search for the contract
to hastily sign it - but instead the two find documents that Giorgio had
his name changed and under his real name was a convicted murderer. Giorgio
returns before Amati and Henriette can find the contract and tells them
he'll have a new contract set up the next day (without telling Amati he
has grown wise to the silver), and insists that Amati will not only stay
for the night but also join him on a fox hunt - which Amati misinterprets
as an attempt on his life. Things don't get better over the evening, and
eventually, Amati confesses to Henriette to being a coward who has only
used above ruse to steal his way into her heart for the contract, and he
eventually makes an escape. Giorgio meanwhile has found out that Henriette
has found out his secret and proves to her beyond doubt that he isn't the
convicted killer she has thought him to be, just someone with the same
name who changed it to avoid being mistaken for him. And suddenly, Giorgio
seems all the more exciting to Henriette. Now the giallo
is a pretty much exclusively Italian genre of serial killer murder
mysteries of the psychological horror or psycho-thriller variety of the
1960s and 70s and beyond that had a strong root in the German krimi genre
that peaked in the early to mid 1960s, first and foremost due to the
popularity of the German
Edgar Wallace adaptations. So from that perspective it only
seems fitting that the first Italian Edgar Wallace adaptation (at least
according to my research) would be called "Giallo" (never
mind of course that the word, meaning "yellow" in English, was
derived from the yellow covers of a series of pulp crime novels by
primarily British and American writers, including Edgar Wallace, released
by publishing house Mondadori). Now having said all that, this Giallo
in question has remarkably little to do with the gialli from decades later
(Mario Bava's La Ragazza che
Sapeva Troppo/The Girl
Who Knew Too Much from 1963 being often cited as the first
"real" giallo), it's rather a crime farce with actually not even
one dead body throughout. Now taken out of context and by its own terms,
the film is somewhat likeable as it flows nicely, but at the same time it
just can't shake its origins as a stage play, and even if the adaptation
is said to be a loose one, the film has a somewhat stagey feel to it, with
the fox hunt sequence being the sole exception. Also, the film swings back
and forth between suspense piece and all-out farce, and doesn't do too
greatly in either. It's still a likeable little film though that at its
short running time (less than 70 minutes) doesn't outstay its welcome.
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