Morte Suspeita de uma Adolescente

This quite rare movie by Sergio Martino is an odd thing. As the title presumes, it starts off like a typical giallo: A man with sunglasses stalks and slashes a young woman. But after the murder, the movie becomes a film in style of the "poliziescho", the Italian crime movie of the 1970s, as the audience follows an undercover cop searching for the killer and also for the kidnappers of a young boy (but the audience doesn't know for a long time either that the cop really is one and that the murder case and the kidnapping rely to each other). All this culminates (within the first half of the movie) in a car chase which offers enough gags to make the scene pure slapstick.

After that, the giallo style returns as the sunglassed killer goes on a killing spree. The crime movie is back as the plot unfolds to have its motive in mob-style drug dealing. And let's not forget: The killings have also to do with professional child prostitution and abuse. A really wild mix, even more so if one considers that the film sometimes boosts cheap (if mostly funny) humor.

The cool sound track is reminiscent of the early scores by "Goblin" for Dario Argento's films, and it seems that Ernesto Gastaldi, who wrote the story and co-wrote the screenplay with director Martino, was influenced by Massimo Dallamano's great "La Polizia Chiede Aiuto" that was made one year earlier.

All in all, this surely is not Martino's best film (his "pure" gialli are more enjoyable), but if one gets used to the unusual concoction of such different topics and styles, it's an entertaining and sometimes hilariously funny, fast paced and thrilling movie that even boosts some harsh social comment.

This one is slightly odd tonally - there is a bit of poliziotteschi, some giallo and some broad and slapstick humour. If I had to pick a genre to pigeon-hole it in it would be a poliziotteschi. It owes more to that genre than giallo for me. Giallo purists will likely be disappointed. Some giallos have a little humour so that isn't necessarily a problem. This has more humour than I've seen in a giallo before but I think the giallo label goes by the wayside for me for a few reasons. The main one - it can't really be a giallo if you see the face of the killer during the first scenes of the film. After seeing the killer it is not a whodunnit, more of a who-hired-them-to-do-it and why? It also leaves you dangling as far as exactly what the main character's role or job is until about 40 minutes in. A few other fairly crucial giallo conventions or tropes are flouted here but I won't say which as they would be potential spoilers. There are some heavy nods to (or maybe little borrowings from) Profondo Rosso, which precedes this by only a few months - evidence of how quickly these films were made. The first track on the soundtrack is certainly Goblin-esque and the trashy, falling-apart car I assume was "inspired" by Argento's film. The tone wobbles around and this may make or break the film for you. It feels deliberate and mischievous rather than clumsy. Once you get that it will break with convention, and play with tone and genre I think it is a lot of fun. The price you pay is less tension, although some is achieved especially in the latter half. It is reasonably paced and a few bits of the humour work. The main two characters interact quite nicely together. There is no glaring deadwood in terms of the actors. The last hour of the film is more conventional and rattles along well. Glasses (spectacles) are a running theme - the main character spends the whole film repeatedly breaking his prescription glasses and the killer wears mirrored sunglasses (which enable a few nice little camera shots). I can't resist mentioning two other things. (I guess this technically counts as a spoiler but it is not related to any plot or anything crucial). Firstly, during a car chase they hit the front of a bicycle and when the bicycle loses its front wheel it magically turns into a unicycle leading to a wobbly ride and fall. Secondly, again in a car chase, there is an unfortunate pedestrian who is narrowly missed (twice) and manages to contort himself into an almost-breakdance-move headspin both times before dizzyingly walking into a lamppost to knock himself out. (Was this breakdancing move around in 1975? - I don't know). The subject matter should be dark. Abuse/prostitution of underage girls (a la What Have You Done To Solange and What Have They Done To Your Daughters), a network of corruption, cover-ups, murder etc.....). This film feels less dark, depressing and gritty and has less exploitation-type sequences. In fact, for this type of film it is quite light on nudity. If that disappoints you it does have a topless Barbara Magnolfi in what seems to be her first credited role - if you are a fan of 70s Italian genre films you will possibly know her from Suspiria (as Olga) and Sister of Ursula (in the lead role). With the subject matter it seems wrong to say but this film is quite fun. Have a look. I definitely like it. Just don't come in to it with a fixed idea of what genre it is and what that genre should constrain it to.

Technically, The Suspicious Death of a Minor is a giallo. It has a mystery, and all of the exploitation elements of prostitution, crime, and violence. Too bad this film wanted to be trashy American tv.

As an American watching Italian films, part of what I appreciate about giallos is that they are very Italian (though some are also Spanish) and differ from American mysteries and horror from the 1970s in significant ways - with the exception of Alfred Sole's Alice Sweet Alice and the British film Don't Look Now. These last two films are excellent English-language tributes to the giallo. But The Suspicious Death of a Minor is decidedly NOT an excellent tribute to American cinema.

Essentially, it's a buddy comedy featuring an adult man in his 30s befriending a younger petty thief of about 20, who showers his mother and siblings with gifts he steals by snatching purses from street walkers and other tacky ventures. They team up to solve a murder, and from there it's all downhill.

This mediocre giallo is filled to the brim with fist fights, numerous car accidents, and slapstick comedy better suited to an episode of The Dukes of Hazard and features mystery elements reminiscent of the cop soap Hart to Hart rather than of giallo-inspiration Agatha Christie. I mean, I can see why some people would like this sort of thing, but I just don't. There was some physical comedy which appeared to be an intentional homage to 1920s silent film which I appreciated, but it just wasn't enough to carry the flick. I cannot believe Sergio Martino was even involved with this.

I had never heard of this before its Sazuma "Special Edition" DVD came along (though I actually acquired it recently from ulterior sources); consequently, I took the film to be a very minor Martino effort – so that I went into it without much expectations. However, I was pleasantly surprised by how enjoyable it all turned out to be – more so, in fact, than some of the director's more popular titles…though I can see how anyone hoping for a typical giallo will be confused and disappointed by its overriding poliziottesco elements, and even more so the sometimes daft comedy touches (on which I'll elaborate later on). Thematically, SUSPECTED DEATH OF A MINOR is an unofficial companion to the Massimo Dallamano trilogy of gialli revolving around teenage prostitution rackets – WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO SOLANGE? (1972), WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO YOUR DAUGHTERS? (1974) and RINGS OF FEAR (1978; completed by Alberto Negrin after the film-maker's tragic demise in a road accident); in that regard, it's hardly original, but Martino (whose last genre outing this proved to be) lends it his customary flair – aided a great deal by a splendid Goblinesque score courtesy of the obscure Luciano Michelini. Casting is another asset, led by Claudio Cassinelli – who would himself suffer an untimely death 10 years later in a helicopter crash while filming another Martino film! – as the unconventional hero (forever breaking his spectacles, he starts off as mystery-man and rogue but is eventually revealed to be a special undercover cop), Mel Ferrer as his long-suffering superior, and Massimo Girotti as the obligatory would-be respectable but all-powerful businessman pulling the strings. While there are obviously a number of female figures here (though, uncharacteristically, little nudity), none really emerges to take center-stage – including late starlet Jenny Tamburi who, despite a severely underwritten role, is still given an unwarranted cruel fate! The film comes to life principally in a handful of well-staged set-pieces, which take the form of chases rather than murders – an assassination attempt aboard a roller-coaster ride, a cliff-hanging sequence involving the opening roof of a cinema (which, according to an online review, is showing Martino's own YOUR VICE IS A LOCKED ROOM AND ONLY I HAVE THE KEY [1972]!), and the climactic across-the-water showdown between Cassinelli and Girotti. However, the most memorable (because it is so unexpected) certainly emerges the comical one in which the hero and his petty-thief pal take the Police on a wild ride – driving a rickety machine whose doors are constantly getting dislodged, Cassinelli asks his companion to throw them at their pursuers…but there's also a bit where a man riding a bike is left with a mere tricycle following a brush with the speeding vehicles and another which, hilariously, has a hit-and-run victim literally land and roll (repeatedly) on his head!

If you are expecting a 'giallo' to unfold, and with the title, box art and opening of the film, you have every right to do so, you will be a little disappointed.

For instead this is a right hotchpotch of styles and levels of seriousness. Once aware that this is going to go all over the place and include social comment and slapstick comedy whilst retaining a sleazy back story of under age prostitution one can relax and enjoy, at face value, a most likable film.

Made after most of his 'giallo' greats this is always watchable with fine moments. It's just that it's not what you would expect.