Calling All Police Cars (1975)
"...a tutte le auto della polizia" (original title)

Director:

Mario Caiano

Writers:

Massimo Felisatti, Fabio Pittorru

Stars:

Antonio Sabato, Luciana Paluzzi, Enrico Maria Salerno

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Antonio Sabato	...	Commissario Fernando Solmi
Luciana Paluzzi	...	Ispettrice Giovanna Nunziante
Enrico Maria Salerno	...	Police Chief Carraro
Gabriele Ferzetti	...	Professore Andrea Icardi
Elio Zamuto	...	Professore Giacometti
Ettore Manni	...	Enrico Tummoli
Marino Masé	...	Franz Hekker - 'Francesco Pagano'
Bedy Moratti	...	Emilia Icardi
Adriana Fiore	...	Stripper
Franco Ressel	...	Gynaecologist
Margherita Horowitz	...	Antonietta - Icardi's maid
Tino Bianchi	...	Police Commissioner
Valentino Macchi	...	Petrol Station Attendant
Andrea Lala	...	Marshall Attardi
Benedetto Benedetti

Storyline

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Plot Keywords:

giallo | ellipsis in title | police dog | police investigation | punctuation in title | 

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Genres:

Crime | Horror | Thriller

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Details

Country:

Italy

Language:

Italian

Release Date:

28 August 1975 (Italy)

Also Known As:

The Maniac Responsible

Filming Locations:

Nemi Lake, Rome, Lazio, Italy

Company Credits

Production Co:

Capitol International, Jarama Film

Technical Specs

Runtime:

95 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

User Reviews

Not great, but worth a look

A teenage girl from a wealthy family mysteriously disappears. After her body is found at the bottom of a lake the police begin an intense investigation that leads to a teenage prostitution ring and several more bloody murders, but the actual killer may be someone much closer to the home.

This was one of the Italian films from the 1970's that were inspired by Massimo Dallamano's "schoolgirl gialli" where dissipated, middle-class schoolgirls become involved in drug orgies, prostitution, back-alley abortions, and other sordid goings on, and eventually meet a sticky end. These films were at once sleazy and hypocritcally moralistic. They range from the Dallamano's relatively classy "What Have You Done to Solange?" (loosely based on an Edgar Wallace novel)to Alberto Negrin's irredeemably trashy "Trauma" (with its infamous death-by-dildo scene). This movie most resembles Dallamano's second film "What Have They Done to Your Daughters?" in that it tries to mitigate the sleaze a little by putting straight-arrow cops at the moral center and focusing on police procedure rather than the sexual intrigue. In a way though, this makes the movie even more objectionable. The most disturbing thing about it isn't really the tender age of the victims (the actresses, at least, all look like they'd long since blown out the candles on their 18th birthday cakes), but the way their characters are almost literally reduced to pieces of meat: It really doesn't matter whether they are alive, lying unconscious on abortionist's table, or lying dead on a slab--it's all pretty much just an excuse to get them nice and naked.

Like "Daughters?" this film tries to include a feminist angle by including former Bond girl Luciana Paluzzi as one of the investigating detectives, but they really manage to waste her. Still, it's not all bad. The director Mario "Nightmare Castle" Caiano was certainly visually talented and the film is stylish and nowhere near as sleazy as by all rights it should be. And if you think about it, aside from the full-frontal nudity, these films anticipated (if probably not inspired) a lot of more recent American television like the "who-killed-Laura-Palmer?" intrigue of David Lynch's "Twin Peaks" or the morbid forensic intrigue of the "CSI" series. Not great, but worth a look.