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The owner of a pub mainly frequented by day labourers is killed, and neither his daughter Hanna (Ilona Grübel) nor barmaid Miss Matusek (Hilde Volk) claim to have seen anything - but both drop hints about one of the regulars, Mozart (Werner Pochath), a mentally challenged but good-natured guy who hangs out with Krass (Horst Frank), the leader of the pack, Krüger (Klaus Schwarzkopf), Palle (Fred Haltiner) and alcoholic Bender (Gerd Baltus), all day labourers with criminal records who only rarely look for work but rather a good time and who aren't above occasional petty theft. Inspector Keller (Erik Ode) and his team investigate, but apart from gnawing suspicions that Hanna and Matusek know more than they let on, and that Krass's gang are very probably involved, they come up with very little - so one of Keller's assistants, Walter (Günther Schramm), goes undercover as an alcoholic day labourer, and he's welcomed into Krass's gang with open arms after he claims he has done time with an acquaintance of Krass. It soon seems the whole gang want to draw suspicion to Mozart, and when Keller and company investigate they find out that Mozart has in fact regularly spent his nights in the pub upon Hanna's request and without her father - the deceased - knowing, and apparently what could have happened was the victim-to-be having found Mozart in the pub and being killed in the ensuing struggle. Thing is, Krass and company are much too adamant dropping subtle hints for the story not to sound fishy. Eventually, the gang find out Walter's a cop, and instead of using that knowledge to their advantage by feeding him false information to help with framing Mozart, they decide to kill him - but Walter's saved by the police, and Krass and gang are rounded up, and now it's proven that not Mozart but the rest of the gang have killed the pub owner after he and Bender got into a fight as the pub owner refused to sell him any more liquor.

It sure is fun to find two mainstays of German and European exploitation cinema, Horst Frank and Werner Pochath, in this episode, which other than that is a rather routine episode, that on one hand offers the rather likeable and relateable team of investigators led by Erik Ode, on the other a slightly convoluted investigation for a straight-forward murder case, and very stilted dialogue, especially when it comes to the day labourers at the center of the case. Not one of the best episodes I may add, but as so many episodes of Der Kommissar, well worth a look for rather than in spite of its shortcomings on the script side of things, as oddly enough they help to create and fortify the world the series is set in.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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