Die Waffe, die Stunde, das Motiv

"The Weapon, The Hour and The mobile are the 3 most important things you need to know about a murder" say Renzo Montagnani. It's also the title of this classic giallo.

It's not a revolution of the genre but a classic expression of what a good suspenser must be. No crazy & wild camerawork but a genuine suspensful screenplay, with sharp dialogues & excellent, coherent and plausibles twists. Where directors such as Umberto Lenzi who rather play upon the incredible twists & turns a giallo is supposed to bring then on flashy camera angles, Francesco Mazzei choose the simple way.

Discreet yet precise camera work, less murders and actors than usual but a gloomy script revolving around a priest having two affairs at the same time with two women. When he decides to stop both, he gets killed in his church.

The cleverness of it all is in the way the script chooses to focus on the relationships between the characters than to elaborate murder after murder. The tensions between all of them are more visible than usual. At the same time, it also shows the private life of the detective investigating the case. Disenchanted but always professionnal, he gives some touch of humour which always hit the mark.

Some scenes ar quite surreal & nightmarish as when the nuns decide to expiate the crimes the priest committed before he died. They just whip their bare back with screaming preys til they faint. Just incredible. the other FX are very effective and the murders scenes look impressive : master Carlo Rambaldi (King Kong, ET) did it again.

The actors are all first rate : Renzo Montagnani proves he really can act, Eva Czemerys is always as magnetic & mysterious than in Giuseppe Bennatti's poor L'ASSASSINO HA RISERVATO NOVE POLTRONE and Bedy Moratti shows some incredible capacity to be both & strong at the same time in one single scene. Amazing actress.

L'arma, l'ora, il movente is a superior giallo in quality. Sleaze addicts & euroschlockers will be disappointed but movie buffs will certainly go for this very entertairning and chilling suspenser til the very end.

According Salvatore Puntillo the director Francesco Mazzei also was a producer, cutting any extra cost whenever it could boost the pre-arranged low budge, as we can state through the low-profile casting which didn't have any major star, in other hand the story is very exciting, where a trendy Priest (Maurizio Bonuglia) has been a sinful behavior on two heretic affairs with two different women, a married Orchidea Durantini (Bedi Moratti) and the fortune-teller Giulia Pisani (Eva Czemerys) ends up murdered inside the church witnessed by an orphaned boy.

Soon a Police Commissioner Franco Boito (Renzo Montagnani) starts investigate the weirdo case together with his sidekick Moriconi (Salvatore Puntillo) after several inquires at crime scene and all nuns hosted there, meanwhile Giulia appears dead with slashed throat, she was one of suspect, after an exhaustive work Commissioner Franco finally figures out that Orchidea's jealous husband ought be the main suspect, later he is found dead at your house apparently committed suicide, then closing the case, not so fast as usually a final twist comes.

The movie touches in a neuralgic matter about an unholy hidden affairs on church, exposing many auto-flagellation upon a whip, such scourge was routinely used to by Priest and Nuns to purge wicked throughs, many nudity scenes were scattered along the picture as well, fine Giallo with a modest casting, nevertheless not devoid of interest.

Thanks for reading.

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First watch: 2024 / How many: 1 / Source: DVD / Rating: 7.

A young clergyman, Don, has had two loves, and now he chooses one of them, Julia, as his only one lover. But soon Don is found dead in the chapel. And there is a witness, Felcio, who tells almost nothing about the murder to the police. But the murderer continues to take people's lives, and finally Felcio decides to inform of the very secret of the first murder... This is a typical Giallo film with good music by Francesco De Masi. The problem is that he does better jobs in other films. Indeed almost everything about this film seems to have average quality and therefore I have almost nothing say about it. Still it can be said that the story itself, which is nether complex nor confused, has at least one interesting side. Person like the first and leading victim, Don, is immoral. And killing the immoral person is much more immoral. But not revealing those immoralities is immoral? Or is there clear distinction between killing and letting-die? Although this film as a whole is not a moralistic one its religious and/or philosophical side, which seems to support the classic claim that there can be a deductive proof that the God does not exist based upon the existence of the evil, is rather unique and therefore can be interesting.

Eureka! What a wonderful feeling when realizing that, after having seen more 150 Italian Gialli varying from absolutely brilliant to terribly awful, there are still great gems out there for me to discover! "The Hour, The Weapon, The Motive" is not your typically textbook Giallo, because of its unusual setting and only a limited number of murders, but it contains enough highlights and ingenious twists to appeal to fans of the genre, and admirers of sleazy Euro-exploitation in general.

The plot introduces priest Don Giorgio, who obviously chose the wrong profession. He's handsome and a bit wild, and he certainly doesn't mind a bit of smooching with two gorgeous ladies that also work as volunteers in the nuns' convent/boarding school where he teaches music. But Don Giorgio gets ashamed of his sinful behavior, and after another session of self-flagellation, he decides to devote himself to God again and terminate both his affairs. Shortly after, though, is brutally stabbed to death inside the convent. Who's the killer? One of his ex-mistresses? Their husbands? A jealous nun? A young orphan boy who lives in the convent may have witnessed something, but he doesn't speak. The rebellious Commissioner Franco Boito must resolve the case, but he falls head over heals in love with a suspect with the lovely name Orchidea.

"The Hour, "The Weapon, The Motive" is a slow-paced but intriguing thriller that remains mysterious and unpredictable, and this despite the relatively low number of potential suspects. Writer/director Francesco Mazzei, who's completely unknown to me, compensates for the shortage of clues and body count by inserting a couple of bizarre gimmicks; - most notably a jaw-dropping scene in which all the nuns at the convent undress and flagellate themselves for several minutes, and this supposedly to redeem the deceased Don Giorgio of his sins. Really odd, and strangely enticing. The trick with the key and the rope (you'll see) is pure Giallo-gold, and the ending is also marvelous. The one thing I regret most is that Mazzei didn't opt for a juicier and more flamboyant title. I would suggest "Eight-hundred Lashes for a Murder" or "Death to the Sound of a Bouncing Marble".

In "The Weapon,the Hour and the Motive" the murder victim is a priest.Father Giorgio is stabbed to death in his congregation church.Two police detectives Franco Boito and Moriconi investigate his murder.The main suspects are Giorgio's two lovers Giulia and Orchidea as he wanted to break up with both.There is also an orphaned boy who saw too much from his attic hideout and he will resolve the mystery.Overlooked Italian giallo stylishly made by Francesco Mazzei.There are some silly comedic moments and some effective shocks.The throat slashing scene is fairly graphic and there is a bit of nudity and sexual perversion.Mazzei is capable of building suspense pretty well too."The Weapon,the Hour and the Motive" deserves more recognition.7 out of 10.