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A French exchange student (Carole André) is found dead in a park,
apparently after she was raped she was stabbed and her body pushed down a
hill. Inspector Berardi (Silvano Tranquilli) does some investigations, and
soon enough he zeroes in on Alessandro Marchi (Giancarlo Sbragia), a
popular TV weatherman. Berardi might not find a smoking gun, but more and
more evidence points in Alessandro's direction. Alessandro's lawyer though
is his best friend Giulio (Günther Scholl), so Alessandro figures he's in
good hands, and even his daughter Sarah's (Wendy D'Olive) boyfriend
Giorgio (Helmut Berger) testifies in his favour, even if he twists the
truth a bit - but ultimately all comes to naught when he fails to produce
a material witness for his alibi, his mistress Marta (Lorella De Luca),
and he's condemned to life in prison - much to the delight of his lawyer
who has long had an affair with Alessandro's wife (Ida Galli) and now
doesn't need to hush things up anymore ... until more girls are murdered,
in pretty much the same way as the French exchange student was, and
everybody thinks that's evidence for Alessandro's innocence - only for
inspector Berardi, things don't quite click. But when Alessandro's
re-tried and finally Marta does show up to corroborate his alibi, the
court sees no other way than to release Alessandro - which means the
killer's still out there ... Being a cross between whodunit,
police prodecural and courtroom drama with giallo elements deliberately
thrown in, The Bloodstained Butterfly manages to be a very tense
thriller, thanks to a very clever screenplay that keeps one guessing
despite giving away clues early, an elegant yet subtle directorial effort,
cool camerawork and a first rate cast. It's really one of these films one
wishes they'd make more of nowadays! And a little trivia,
originally this film was supposed to be an entry of German Rialto
Film's Edgar
Wallace-series (despite not being based on Wallace at all),
but eventually the series as such was scrapped and Rialto
refrained from co-producing this movie altogether.
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