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Der Kommissar - Traum eines Wahnsinnigen
episode 43
West Germany 1972
produced by Helmut Ringelmann for Neue Münchner Fernsehproduktion/ZDF
directed by Wolfgang Becker
starring Erik Ode, Günther Schramm, Reinhard Glemnitz, Fritz Wepper, Curd Jürgens, Christine Kaufmann, Günther Stoll, Victor Beaumont, Wera Frydtberg, Alfons Höckmann, Horst Frank
written by Herbert Reinecker, series created by Helmut Ringelmann, Herbert Reinecker, title theme by Herbert Jarczyk
TV-series Der Kommissar, Harry Klein
review by Mike Haberfelner
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Kabisch (Horst Frank), inmate of an insane asylum, kills an orderly and
the asylum's head (Victor Beaumont), before making a daring escape in that
man's car - and it's pretty much a foregone conclusion where he's headed:
To a certain hotel where his adopted daughter Eva (Christine Kaufmann), a
circus performer, is staying for the next month - after all, he was thrown
into the asylum for trying to kill his daughter in the first place. Now
it's up to inspector Keller (Erik Ode) and
his team (Günther Schramm, Reinhard Glemnitz, Fritz Wepper) to save the
daughter, but there's a problem, Kabisch is a master of disguise, and he's
brilliant in imitating other people, so finding him will be mighty hard.
HIs doctor at the asylum, Dr. Hochstätter (Curd Jürgens) joins Keller
and company in their search, but it becomes more and more clear that he
somehow sides with Kabisch, having taken on many of his views - including
the one that with his adopted daughter, Kabisch has created the perfect
being, and by marrying trick-shot artist Rassner (Günther Stoll) she has
somehow soiled that perfection and thus has to be eliminated. After much
to and fro, Kabisch somehow manages to lure everyone away from Eva, even
those who should know better, and catch her alone - and it's really when
his hands are already round her throat that Keller and his men can
intervene and takehim in. But there's still Dr. Hochstätter, who seems
more than willing to finish what Kabisch has started ... Now
this episode clearly steps into giallo territory, and is at times quite
good at it: There's the psycho-killer with a cool gimmick, there's the
circus backdrop that adds colour (even though the series is in black and
white), and there are the rather far-fetched psychological underpinnings.
It could have been a piece of really good crime television for sure, but
unfortunately, screenwriter Herbert Reinecker gets in his own way: His
understanding of psychology in general and psychopathology in particular
is rather sketchy and further marred by a tendency for sensationalism, his
trademark stilted dialogues get in the way of things a few times too
often, and not all of the characters' actions and reactions make perfect
sense. That all said, it's still one of the more entertaining episodes of Der
Kommissar, it just falls several feet short of what it could have
been.
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