This is a typical Matarazzo melodrama of infinite complications and ladies in deep trouble. It begins with a wealthy businessman's attempted sucide because of failed speculations, which puts his daughter (Silvana Pampanini) in a tough spot. She is compelled to accept an old friend of the family as her husband, although she does not love him, while she is engaged to a handsome young doctor (Massimo Girotti) whom she loves but is compelled to leave, telling him to just forget her without an explanation. Life goes on, she is a good exemplary wife but without love, but she has one daughter, and we can never be sure as who the father is. Her husband is frustrated by her frigidity and goes to Florence on a trip, bringing a girl friend with him just for company. This is Irene Papas, here very young and unrecognizable. There is an accident, she gets away while he gets paralyzed for life in his legs and is only good for a wheelchair for the rest of his life. Irene Papas visits him and presses him for money, and when she doesn't get it she gives him a drug in a drink and gets what she wants out of his safe and gets away again. Meanwhile he is found dead when his wife comes home, and she is accused of murder. Her late husband's doctor happens to be Masssimo Girotti, who returns on stage, and he has many questions to ask of her. Complications pile up, her daughter is taken away from her and put into an institution, and things look very bad, when also Irene Papas returns on stage with Franco Fabrizi as her corrupt solicitor, by whose help she tries to get away one more time, but doctor Massimo Girotti recognizes her from the hospital when she visited her wheelchaired victim, and pieces start falling into place. It's not a very remarkable film, the plot is typical for Matarazzo's dark world of stranded human relationships, but the music is good, the acting is all right, and the conclusion is satisfactory. No complaints but no great enthusiasm either.
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