The Designated Victim

 

"You have a great talent for simplifying everything, don't you?"

 

Advertising executive Stefano (Tomas Milian) has the opportunity to sell his company for a massive sum, but the shares are in his wife's name and Luisa (Marisa Bartoli) refuses to sell. Despondent, Stefano takes his mistress Fabienne (Katia Christine) to Venice, where they meet Russell Brand look-alike, Count Matteo Tiepolo (Pierre Clémenti), a flamboyant libertine, in a chance encounter. Stefano keeps crossing paths with Matteo and the two share their problems - Stefano tells about his wife and Matteo confides about his abusive brother. Their problems would each be solved with the death of someone in their lives and Matteo suggests that they kill for each other. With no motive connecting them to each other's crimes, neither would be a suspect. Problems escalate for Stefano until his wife turns up dead. Did Matteo take his joke too far? Is he expecting Stefano to kill his brother in return? With the police hot on his trail, Stefano has to think fast.

Though she wasn't given credit, The Designated Victim (not to be confused with The Fourth Victim) is clearly based on Patricia Highsmith's "Strangers on a Train." It's a fantastic concept ideally suited for a giallo remake, but this adaptation suffers from slow pacing, too many unnecessary scenes and too much detail weighing down the plot. It could easily have been edited down to a lean and more suspenseful hour and 15 minute-long film.

• This movie almost didn't make it onto the list, because it lacks the mystery component essential to my definition of "giallo" - we know who the killers are throughout the movie. But it's so stylish and uses so many other tropes of the genre that I decided to include it anyway.

• In an egregious example of "inept police," Stefano tries to tell the Commissioner the whole story but the Commissioner not only won't believe him, but refuses to investigate the claims and stubbornly insists on sticking with his own (incorrect) theory.

• The title The Designated Victim is the direct translation of the Italian La Vittima Designata, but it's sometimes mis-translated as Murder By Design.

That the Hell Am I Watching?:

There's a lot of wild stuff in this movie involving Matteo's machinations, but the weirdest involves his partner at the beginning of the film.

 

Serious Vampira vibes. I believe this is actress Cathy Marchand, who is uncredited in the movie. On the boat back from the Casino, Stefano asks about their relationship. Matto refers to her as his "slave" and casually mentions that he recently "sold" her just for the experience. Yikes.

At that point Stefano should have said "Well, thanks for the ride, I'll just swim from here," then dived off the boat and freestyled it back to his hotel. Roll credits.

Fashion Moment:

It's not surprising that Matteo, an obscenely wealthy hedonist, has the most decadent wardrobe. Layers and layers of clothes and always with those leather gloves and a floor-length coat around his shoulders. He's not afraid of color, but his fashion sense seems to be based on texture, more than anything else.

While we're here, let's take a moment to appreciate this pair of high-angle interior shots in all their mod 1970's technicolor glory.