Blutspur im Park

One of the best gialli to come out of Italy in the 1969-77 period, it's very stylish and (of course) convoluted, but always interesting and ultimately quite clever. For once the solution to the mystery actually matters (and makes sense!), and the motive behind the murders and the finale are worthy of Agatha Christie. I highly recommend it. Great soundtrack too, I just bought the CD.

While walking through a park in a rainy day, the young Françoise Pigaut (Carole André) is stabbed to death by man wearing raincoat and hat. Inspector Berardi (Silvano Tranquilli) is assigned to investigate the case and soon the TV anchor Alessandro Marchi (Giancarlo Sbragia) becomes the prime suspect. His daughter Sarah Marchi (Wendi D'Olive) was Françoise's best friend and their common friend Giorgio (Helmut Berger) had a crush on Françoise. Alessandro's friend and attorney Giulio Cordaro (Günther Stoll) defends him in the court but Alessandro is found guilty and sent to prison. When two other women are murdered and it is found that Alessandro's wife Maria Marchi (Evelyn Stewart) is the lover of Giulio, the defense asks for mistrial and Alessandro has another trial. Who might be the killer?

"Una farfalla con le ali insanguinate", a.k.a. "The Bloodstained Butterfly", is a crime story with a great twist in the end. The suspenseful screenplay begins with the presentation of several characters and is confused, and the slow pace is tiresome. But the story is good, and the unexpected conclusion surprises the viewer. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Uma Borboleta com as Asas Ensanguentadas" ("A Butterfly with the Bloodstained Wings")

Duccio Tessari is probably best known as the director of several Spaghetti Westerns, most prominently the "Ringo" films with Giuliano Gemma, as well as the well-known Italian Crime flick "Tony Arzenta". The man also served as an (uncredited) co-writer of Sergio Leone's Italian Western milestone "Fistful of Dollars", and as a writer of several sword and sandal films in the early 60s. As a director, Tessari's doubtlessly best films are his two intelligent and plot-driven Gialli, "L'Uomo Senza Memoria" (aka. "The Man Without Memory", 1974) and this gem. "Una Farfalla Con Le Ali Insanguiante" aka. "Bloodstained Butterfly" of 1971 is a terrific, beauty- and suspenseful example for a purely plot-based Giallo that profits from an excellent cast, a great score, wonderful settings and a sublime cinematography. As it is the case with Tessari's other Giallo, "The Man Without Memory", "Bloodstained Butterfly" is a Giallo that focuses on the Mystery more than the Horror-elements of the genre. And the film is indeed a perfectly constructed puzzle of a mystery that is (though convoluted) always easy to follow.

When a French exchange student (Carole André) is murdered by multiple stabbing in a park in Bergamo, the police arrest TV anchor Marchi (Giancarlo Sbragia). Marchi's daughter Sarah (Wendy D'Olive), who was friends with the murdered girl, does not believe in her father's guilt... As said above, this is a purely story-driven Giallo. For genre-standards, there are only very few murders and very little gore. The film is very suspenseful, however, and delivers mystery and innovative twists from the beginning to the end, as a good Giallo should. The beautiful Bergamo locations are a wonderful setting for the film, which is furthermore (in good Giallo-tradition) brilliantly photographed. The beautiful score intensifies the atmosphere, and the film profits from a very good ensemble cast. The characters are all complex and elaborate. The always-sinister Helmut Berger and Italian Grenre-cinema regulars such as Ida Galli ("The Case Of The Scorpion's Tail"), Günter Stoll ("What Have They Done To Solange"), Silvano Tranquilli ("The Black Belly of The Tarantula"), and Giancarlo Sbragia ("Tony Arzenta") all deliver very good performances. As said, for a Giallo this features little violence and gore and also little sleaze, but the magnificently elaborate plot should be more than pleasant to Genre-fans. "Bloodstained Butterfly" is beautifully filmed with a lot of style, and highly recommended to my fellow Giallo-fans.

I only heard about this giallo recently, but it's undoubtedly one of the best examples of the subgenre that I've watched. Besides, from the little I've checked out of Tessari's work so far (incidentally, I've just recorded his Spaghetti Western A PISTOL FOR RINGO [1965] - which I'll catch up with soon enough), it's easily his most significant effort; I should also be getting to PUZZLE (1974), another giallo of his, in the near future.

THE BLOODSTAINED BUTTERFLY (as ever, the title is only peripheral to the main narrative) - which opens with an identification of all the major characters - is especially notable for its complex editing structure, with details of plot related throughout in abrupt flashes (as either part of a lengthy trial sequence, which occupies the majority of its first half, or during troubled lead Helmut Berger's regular fits, which remain unexplained till the finale). While characterization is somewhat aloof (with no real female counterpart to Berger, despite a fair number of women in the cast), the principal actors are well chosen and also include such familiar Euro-Cult faces as Carole Andre' (playing a murdered victim), Evelyn Stewart (the wife of the suspected killer), Silvano Tranquilli (the police detective assigned to the case) and Wolfgang Preiss (the prosecuting attorney).

The narrative is a bit on the seamy side - encompassing (if ever so discreetly) rape, infidelity, paedophelia, pornography, prostitution, etc. - but welcome comedy relief is provided by the interaction between the flustered Tranquilli and his long-suffering junior partner. Unlike many films of its ilk, the audience is kept guessing as to the identity of the villain up to the violent climax (resulting in a curt but satisfyingly bleak ending) and, just as thankfully, the script dispenses with the idea (popularized by Alfred Hitchcock's PSYCHO [1960]) of presenting a forced last-minute explanation - wherein a psychiatrist is appointed to dig into the killer's past, in order to extract some lame motive for his misdeeds. Typically, however, the eclectic score (courtesy of Gianni Ferrio) is masterful - especially in the way a Tchaikovsky symphony is seamlessly woven into the soundtrack!

The film is available on a bare-bones DVD from both Italy and Spain - but it more than merits a decent release in R1 through, say, Blue Underground (given their predilection for such "Euro-Cult" offerings)...

A girl is murdered in a park. A suspect is tried and convicted but the killings continue.

The Bloodstained Butterfly is a giallo that occupies the more restrained side of the genre. Despite having a plot revolving around a series of knife murders, it doesn't really focus on these killings. One is shown briefly in flash-back, while the others are essentially committed off-screen. Instead, the narrative concentrates more on the mystery. For this reason it is on the more sober and intelligent side of the giallo genre. Quite a bit of the story is taken up with the police procedural angle and court-room scenes. And similar to many others in the sub-genre, an intense melodrama underpins the murder mystery; and, as is often the case, it's populated by a group of quite unsympathetic people. These are made up with the usual concoction of the psychologically troubled and the sleazily untrustworthy.

While the emphasis on melodrama and detective/courtroom dynamics might not be to everyone's taste, it works here. The mystery is compelling and you are kept guessing all the way. I can't say I predicted the outcome either, which is always a bonus. But in amongst all of this are some great typical giallo moments such as the opening scenes in the park with the killer making a get away shot from a number of nice angles. In general, as you might expect from this type of film it is photographed well throughout and has a good soundtrack too. It also has a somewhat unusual opening credit sequence where we are introduced to all of the main characters where they are shown with their moniker displayed on screen. This is quite good, as these films almost always have convoluted plot-lines and this helps ease us into proceedings with a quick look at whose who in the film about to start.

The Bloodstained Butterfly is overall a pretty involving mystery. It isn't a horror-orientated thriller at all though, so if that's what you're after you'd be best looking elsewhere. But it has the specific mood and essence that early 70's gialli have. If you're a fan of the sub-genre you should check this one out.