Just four years after making his ornate
and still shocking giallo The Bloodstained Butterfly, Duccio Tessari dabbled
in and out of the spaghetti western subgenre and the noir genre again before
once more returning to giallo in 1974 with Puzzle, an ensemble thriller
involving amnesia, drug trade, double crossing and brutal murder.Co-written by Tessari, the film prominently
features Luc Merenda from Sergio Martino’s giallo classic Torsoas an
Italian man trapped in London stricken with amnesia.But after a mystery man in black named Philip
(Manfred Freyberger) starts following him, it becomes clear he and his wife
Sara (Senta Berger) are in danger due to missing drugs and longstanding overdue
debts.
Courtesy of VCI Entertainment
Like most giallo fare, the film is
partially a travelogue of Portofino, Italy with Tessari’s cinematographer Giulio
Albonico’s lovely imagery of the city scape including but not limited to
tourism, swanky bars with lots of whiskey, yacht rides and a glimpse of Italian
lifestyle.Luc Merenda and Senta Berger
both exude strong screen presence, with Merenda being a regular of giallo fare
and Berger always being a stunning actress.The film also features giallo starlet Anita Strindberg though in a
substantially smaller role than The Case of the Scorpion’s Tail. Also strong is the film's original score by Tessari regular Gianni Ferrio fresh off of The Bloodstained Butterfly, working to create a mood of both contemporary Italian luxury and giallo thrills and chills. Visually the film sports a lot of great
highlights of Portofino and functions as something of a chase caper ala
Hitchcock with elements of old fashioned giallo thrills including but not
limited to chainsaw murder.Sadly
however, the forthcoming 4K restoration released on blu-ray by VCI
Entertainment leaves much to be desired.An undoctored scan replete with inconsistent color tonal range and print
damage, one wonders what might have been if Arrow Video or Vinegar Syndrome got
their hands on it instead.Oh well, the
film nonetheless remains highly watchable even if the picture and sound quality
have ample room for improvement.
Courtesy of VCI Entertainment
An intriguing and sexy giallo thriller
from one of its regular purveyors, Puzzle is a solid effort from Duccio
Tessari who between his gialli and spaghetti westerns proved himself to be one
of Italy’s most skillful stock trade filmmakers of the time. Fans eager for more gialli will be pleased
with the film if they can get past the sub-par transfer quality. Though not as ornate as The Bloodstained
Butterfly, this one was a lot more involving and included some startlingly
brutal moments of violence even giallo fans will be surprised by. While my favorite Tessari at the moment is
still A Pistol for Ringo, Puzzle did not disappoint as a giallo
exercise at the height of modern Italian exploitation cinema.
