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Gern hab' ich die Frau'n gekillt
Killer's Carnival
Le Carnaval des Barbouzes / Spie contro il Mondo / Karneval der Killer / Spy against the World / Where are you Taking that Woman
Austria/Italy/France 1966
produced by
Karl Spiehs for Intercontinental Film, Metheus Film, Paris Interproductions
directed by Sheldon Reynolds, Alberto Cardone, Robert Lynn
starring Stewart Granger, Pierre Brice, Lex Barker, Karin Dor, Pascale Petit, Margaret Lee, Walter Giller, Johanna Matz, Klaus Kinski, Agnès Spaak, Peter Vogel, Richard Münch, Carmen G.Cervera, Allen Pinson, Herbert Fux, Carla Calò, Fortunato Arena, Pietro Ceccarelli, Luciano Pigozzi (= Alan Collins)
screenplay by Sheldon Reynolds, Rolf Olsen, Ernesto Gastaldi, Vittorio Salerno, music by Claudius Alzner
review by
Mike Haberfelner
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A ladykiiller (Peter Vogel) - in the literal sense of the word - on the
run breaks into the house of a professor (Richard Münch) one evening, and
to pass the time he tells the professor to tell him three crime stories:
- The first story is set in Vienna and involves a private eye (Stewart
Granger) looking for a lady's (Johanna Matz) brother's killer because he
believes her in danger, and after a brush-off with a local gangster boss,
he finds the killer to be the victim's best friend and finds out the two
of them were in drug smuggling. and at the very end, our private eye has
the actual killer shot by the gangster boss's gunmen ... only to then find
out his employer was never in any real danger at all and the man shadowing
her was actually hired by her to make him take her case ... Herbert Fux
plays a gunman in this one, Walter Giller plays Stewart Granger's right
hand man.
- Top agent Mr Brice (Pierre Brice) comes to Rome to deliver certain
all-important documents, but soon enough, he finds himself captured by a
gang called the Kitsch Killer Boys, who also want to get their hands on
the documents - which against all odds Brice hasn't got on him. Brice
eventually manages to escape and take a cute blonde, Linda (Margaret Lee)
- who of course will before long turn out to be a spy for the other side -
with him, but once he retrieves the documents, they are stolen by the
Kitsch Killer Boys ... but unsurprisingly, the documents are encoded, and
since only Brice seems to have the key, Linda has to seduce him for better
or worse to get the information from him. But Brice, who has long found
out her identity, only gives her the information to be led ba her to the
dragon's lair, and soon the Killer Kitsch Boys receive a good clobbering
while Brice retrieves the documents ... only to in headquarters learn that
they were only a decoy and absolutely worthless to friend and foe alike.
Still, in headquarters, Brice runs into Linda once more who wants to steal
the actual documents ... but he has somehting else in mind.
- Private eye Cassidy (Lex Barker) stumbles upon a case involving 4
bargirls that somehow has to do with the assassination of the Brazilian
president ... and to really get to the bottom of the story, Cassidy
travels to Rio (during carneval no less) and poses as the president's
assassin - however, he almot falls into the hands of the real assassin's
employers before he can (just) keep the president from being shot and
unmask his private secretary as the man behind the assassination ... Karin
Dor and Klaus Kinski are in this story, too, though in rather small roles.
Back in the framing story, the ladykiller all of a sudden turns out to
be a police inspector, while the professor turns out to be the actual
ladykiller ... and he kills himself before he can be arrested.
About this anthology film, one thing is certain more than anything else
- it completely lacks direction: while the first story is rather
light-hearted crime drama with a bit of humour thrown in (as much one
would expect having Stewart Granger in the lead), the second story is an
espionage comedy that doesn't shy away from bad slapstick, and the third
story is a no-nonsense crime/espionage drama. The framing story of the
film meanwhile doesn't make the least effort of holding the three segments
together and makes little sense in itself. But considering the main cast
of the film, one can't shake the feeling that the producers were not all
that interested in making a good crime movie in the first place but were
just looking for a way to jump the bandwagon of the success of the then
(at least in continental Europe) immensely popular Winnetou
series:
With Stewart Granger, Pierre Brice and Lex Barker, all three leads of
this film played leads in several Winnetou-movies,
and at least special guest star Karin Dor also played supporting roles in
several while Klaus Kinski made the role of a secondary villain in Winnetou
II (which incidently also starred Brice, Barker and Dor) his own.
Why then it was decided to have Granger, Brice and Barker star in seperate
segments of the film instead of having them appear together remains at
everybody's guess ...
A final verdict ?
A rather mindless crime film, slightly entertaining from a nostalgia
point of view ... but by no means good.
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