The Police Are Blundering in the Dark

Following her strange disappearance, a man begins looking into his girlfriends' strange arrival at a small town that eventually leads him to a remote house occupied by a series of bizarre figures with a deadly secret that eventually brings a killer to the house knocking them off one by one.

This was a maddeningly ineffective and problematic giallo. Among the few positive points with this one is the ability of the film to at least work in the traditional genre elements somewhat effectively enough throughout here. The series of stalking scenes here aren't that bad, with the opening attack of the victim by the side of the road or a woman getting stalked in her bedroom while being spied on undressing and taking care of herself before going to bed, offering up some rather intriguing elements familiar with the genre. Both offer up clunky if still somewhat extended chase scenes featuring the unsuspecting victims going about their lives before running into the madman and being knocked off in silly-yet-brutal fashion featuring a slew of suspenseful stalking tactics and some fine nudity in the process. Other scenes, like a garden-set stalking scene or the killer taking out a victim in gruesome fashion before leaving the bloodied body to drown in a bathtub, make for equally sleazy and graphic encounters that set the stage for the wild finale that bring about some inventive twists for its positive points. Beyond that, there's just not much to this one that works. The main factor to be had here is the interminably boring and dull setup that has almost nothing at all interesting happening for long stretches. The whole idea of the disappearance taking place nearby and him coming to her aide to try to find her is a decent enough hook, much like the later investigation that turns up the family living in the remote house where he starts looking into the truth but it has just nothing all that exciting happening during this time. Dealing with a skeevy gardener making uncomfortable eyes at the young daughter, a scientist trying to make do with his latest discovery while being confined to a wheelchair, and the multitude of side characters that populate the house should've been a recipe for something to happen as he makes his way through the family uncovering what happened. Instead, everything is just undeservedly bland or drags on interminably with the outright worst of it being a dinner sequence that offers up nothing of any interest about anyone and never seems to end even with the notion of them being spied on the whole time. The other factor to this one is the general air of cheapness over everything here. The villa where everything takes place could've had some atmosphere but it's way too bright and cheerful to be effective at generating an air of danger, the flimsy effects give themselves away at nearly every opportunity with the outright goofy manner of their execution trying to look intimidating, and the whole presentation of the fabled machine that gets involved here is a straight mystery as we get nothing about what it is or how it works. The concept of the machine is such that it stretches credibility with how it even manages to catch the killer in the first place, and trying to place the actual figure doing the crimes at the point they were committed is a stretch at best and a gaping plothole at worst as it involves time-travel to pull off. It all comes together into one of the more underwhelming and bottom-tier gialli in the period.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence, Nudity, Language, and sexual scenes.

I guess, after having seen 140 genuine gialli and another 40 giallo-ish thrillers, I have to accept that all the really good ones are discovered already. The only ones that occasionally still float to the surface are obscure, low-rated and forgotten for a reason. The omens for "The Police are Blundering in the Dark" were quite negative from the start. Filmed in 1972 but not released until 1975? 1972 was THE most productive year for the Italian giallo ever! Dozens of gialli were released in this year, some of the best but also many mediocre ones, so how bad must it have been not to receive a release in '72? Three years later the gialli was as good as extinct, but this film still had to be released. You know what? The Poliziotesschi replaced the giallo in terms of popularity, so let's give it a new title with a reference towards the police. Minor problem, maybe... there isn't a police officer in sight throughout the entire film.

And yet, I'd lie if I said I didn't enjoy "The Police are Blundering in the Dark" at all. The script is really poor and hardly makes any sense, but the film features three extended and gruesome murder sequences, during which the female victims are largely naked before getting sliced with scissors, knives or letter openers! Isn't that the essence of gialli?

Moreover, and I just discovered this (thank you, Wikipedia), the name of writer/director Helia Colombo is a pseudonym of Elio Palumbo, and he happens to be the songwriter of - hands down - one of the most beautiful songs ever made; - namely "Tornerò" by the band "I Santo California". If you don't know it, look it up! Fascinating how the creator of such a pure and heavenly song, also made this sleazy and misogynic thriller.

The opening of "The Police Are Blundering in the Dark" features a brutal stabbing of a semi-naked young woman in the countryside.A journalist Giorgio D'Amato agrees to meet his friend Enrichetta at Parisi's villa,but when he arrives the model has been killed with a pair of scissors.Her presence at the villa was requested by the crippled owner of the villa who has invented a device which supposedly photographs thoughts.Helia Colombo's first and only movie is arguably the worst giallo of early 70's.It's cheaply made and deadly dull.There is some sleaze and nudity as all three victims are flashing their breasts during kill scenes.There is even a revolutionary camera that can photograph people's thoughts.My beat-up Super 8-sourced copy looks awful,the score by Aldo Saitto is annoying and the action often drags."La Polizia Brancola Nel Buio" is the last film of Polish-born actress Halina Zalewska,who died tragically in a fire in her Roman apartment in 1976.5 out of 10.

Police are Blundering in the Dark (1975) is an Italian giallo that I recently watched on Prime. The storyline follows an area on the Italian highway known for people going missing. When a young lady has car troubles and stays at a local hotel she's never seen again. Her "boy friend" arrives at the hotel the next morning to pick her up; and when she's gone, she starts investigating the area looking for the killer.

This movie is written and directed by Helia Colombo, in his only major project, and stars Gabriella Giorgelli (The Organizer), Elena Veronese (Scent of a Woman), Halina Zalewska (The Leopard) and Margaret Rose Keil (Escape from Galaxy 3).

This has a lot of worthwhile classic giallo elements - extended chase scenes being a big part of the "horror" elements, all of the victims are female, all of the females are gorgeous, the cinematography and Italian countryside shots are magnificent. The stab scenes were better than I anticipated with some that are very, very good. The inn keeper couple were fantastic and had me cracking up. The soundtrack is a bit cliche but fun and the attire is entertaining and very European. The demise of the killer at the very end is great too.

Overall, this isn't the greatest giallo ever but it's a fun watch. I would score this a 6/10 and strongly recommend it.

(1975) The Police Are Blundering In The Dark/ La polizia brancola nel buio (In Italian with English subtitles) CRIME THRILLER/ MYSTERY/ HORROR

Written and directed by Helia Colombo that has a young lady driver stuck in the middle of the gravel road asking someone to help her change a tire. He pulls out a knife and manages to rip off her clothes before he kills her so that her bare breasts can be seen for the world to see, and of course viewers do not know who the killer is until the very end. The next scene has the servant/ chauffeur, we find out later his name is Alberto (Francisco Cortéz) as he is reading the daily newspaper that indicates about a fourth missing model from the same area with it also reads "The Police are blundering in the dark" hence the title. Alberto then puts the newspaper down as the bus pulls up a lady gets off by the name of Lucia (Gabriella Giorgelli) has accepted the job as housekeeper for the Parissi family household. And while Lucia is settling in, it looks as if Alberto may have had to do something and as he was coming in to the Parissi resident, Enrichetta Blond (Margaret-Rose Keil). And while Enrichetta was driving home, she was driving in the middle of the night while raining and storming real hard, except that her car goes out and she stops by a hotel/ inn to use the phone. Upon calling her boyfriend, Georgio D'Amato (Joseph Arkim) he is sleeping around with another lady, and promises to pick her up the following morning. Forcing her to rent the room and stay the night. She suddenly becomes the second victim and on the following morning when Georgio arrives she is missing. And at this point, he becomes the main star as we find out he is not just a player, but he also happens to be a journalist as well. And her body is nowhere to be found, it would eventually lead him to the other last place she was seen with was the Parissi family household. It is there he is introduced to Edmondo Parissi (Danny P. Gerzog) who is wheelchair bound and is impotent; his wife, Eleonora (Halina Zalewska) and their niece, Sara (Elena Veronese) who lost her parents from a plane crash and sometimes the family doctor, D. Dalla (Richard Fielding) who grows lettuce.

One of the downsides of jotting down set ups and plots of many Eruo slasher movies is that they are forgettable and sometimes hard to describe. The only reason anyone would watch them are the voluptuous nude scenes if the violence itself does not do anything for anyone, the reason why I am giving this one 5 out of 10. Viewers get to see four of the young actresses that count the most to be nude of breasts and sometimes their rear end. Anyways, the movie does not make a ton of sense as the only appearance the police made throughout the entire run is towards the end too little too late. The killer is already dead explaining the why that does not make a ton of sense either.