Given the changing tides in the Italian
film industry as the 80's evolved, it was an inevitably that Sergio
Martino would begin working in television. With the obvious exception
of Dario Argento and Ruggero Deodato who managed stayed in the
theatrical game until 1993, more or less all the Italian genre
masters that ruled the 70's and early 80's would find themselves at
the helm of movies lensed for Italian TV as the 80's closed.
Martino's later career is interesting compared to his contemporaneous
in that he too took to directing made-for-TV movies in the mid-80's
while also bringing in the 90's with memorable fare like American
Tiger (1990) and the outstanding erotic thriller Craving Desire
(1993). By and large, Martino's early TV-films were comedies, though
when he found himself working almost exclusively in TV in the 90's he
reunited with Edwige Fenech, the iconic face of his immortal giallos
The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh (1971), All the Colors of the Dark
(1972) and Your Vice is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key (1972)
for the mini-series Private Crimes (1993), co-produced by Fenech,
which found Martino sitting comfortably back in thriller territory.
Martino would tread familiar ground again after the turning of the millennium with Mozart is a Murderer, a modest TV giallo that would never
challenge Martino's 70's work but nevertheless is the work of an
master craftsman.
Following a botched recital, Professor
Baraldi, the hardened maestro of a prestigious Italian conservatory,
threatens to withhold all the performers from graduating. Later that
night, Chiara, a student and musician in the group is brutally
murdered outside her apartment. Along with a bottle of pills, Antonio
Maccari, the detective assigned to the case notices a kind of cross
carved into Chiara's body, a symbol he quickly becomes familiar with
as more from Chiara's group of friends begin turning up dead marked
with the cross. The deeper Maccari digs into the case, the more he
finds himself in danger as the killer begins taunting him, and by
proxy Dr. Marta Melli, Maccari's girlfriend and a psychologist who's
patients was among Chiari'a friends, dredging up tragic memories of
his late wife's death at the hands of a serial killer potentially
compromising his investigation .
Due to its modest TV origins and
restrictions, it wouldn't be right to claim that Martino was showing
off with Mozart is a Murder (Mozart è un assassino) though the
scripting and direction are so seamlessly controlled and executed
there are several moments where it seems as if Martino was making a
point that even when working in a limited television capacity he
could still hit all the right giallo notes. The film operates very
much like a 70's giallo and despite consisting of various elements
that many familiar with the genre will immediately pick upon, the
film is again in the hands of an assured master with Martino
maneuvering the mystery in various ways up until the final swerve
ensuring that, despite the familiarities the film stands on its own
merits, never coming across as “giallo-by-numbers”, in other
words. The red herrings, though fairly obviously are like everything
else handled especially well as is the way Martino makes more out of
the conservatory setting, a fantastic giallo setting, by weaving
classical music into the murder mystery. Also kept effective is the
lead cop getting too close to the case to his superiors liking, the
drama around Maccari and Dr. Melli never seems contrived with Martino
using it to great advantage late in the film. Despite being
made-for-TV, Martino approaches some pretty dicey subject matter as
it relates to Professor Baraldi and his younger students as well as a
bizarre yet brazen pregnancy-related reveal near the end of the film
involving the murderer.
The film clearly looks like a late 90's
made-for-TV production but here is yet another area where it seems as
if Martino is breezing right past any budgetary hindrances,
delivering a final product that was undoubtedly the slickest and most
professional looking thing to have aired on Italian TV the night of
its premiere. The film might also lack the major presences of a
Fenech or George Hilton but Martino was blessed with a fine band of
players, Eleonora Parlante and Azzurra Antonacci especially who
carry the majority of the film's expertly blueprinted climax. Same
goes for Augusto Fornari Daniela Scarlatti as Maccari and Melli with
Martino given their relationship a fairly emotional arc. The film
also served as an arc of sorts to Martino's giallo career, being the
film film he made in the genre, though he continued working in TV,
including directing several episodes of the police thriller/comedy
series Carabinieri before essentially retiring after 2012. For being
the film in a genre from one best to ever do it, Mozart is a Murderer
should be considered an adequate coda taking into consideration its
TV circumstances. For however many who can't see past the missing
70's giallo flashiness, hopefully there's an equal amount of giallo
fans with more than a passing, surface level interest in the genre
willing to dive deep and appreciate Mozart is a Murderer and
Martino's modest chamber symphony.
