The Girl Who Knew Too Much (1963)

This Italian film is an example of a genre known as Giallo, which is Italian for yellow and is a reference to the color of the cheap paperback mystery and crime novels from which it derives, there are also horror and or erotic sub tones associated with Giallo. The protagonist of this film, Nora Davis (Leticia Roman) is a devotee of this kind of work, in fact when we first see her it is on a plane reading one such novel. Nora is supposed to be a young American women on her way to Rome to visit an ailing aunt. Actress Leticia Roman is hardly convincing as an American, she looks way too Italian for the part, but it kind of works in this film, because like a cheap paperback its not suppose to be realistic.

On her flight to Rome Nora's seat mate hits on her (she's model hot) and strikes up a tentative friendship, but as soon as he gets off the plane is arrested for smuggling marijuana. Nora goes to her aunts home only to find her very sick, her young hansom doctor Marcello Bassi (Italian American actor John Saxon) is there tending to her, he advises Nora of her aunts deteriorating condition and tells her that should the old women have another attack she must immediately administer her medication, he then tells her he will be at the hospital all night and gives her his phone number there should she need help. Well turns out shortly after he leaves she does, the power goes out and auntie has another attack, but by the time Nora has gotten the medicine ready the old lady has passed on. She tries to call the doctor but the phone connection is to poor to be understood, so she decides to go to the hospital which is just off the nearby Piazza di Spagna (you'll see a lot of this Piazza in the movie, its a good location to shoot). In the plaza at night Nora is mugged and the delayed effects of the marijuana cigarette her flight mate secretly gave her start to kick in. Just before blacking out completely Nora swears that she witnesses the murder of a young woman, when she comes to the next morning she is discovered by a policeman and taken to the hospital were she reunites with Dr. Bassi, the obvious love interest.

The 'everything that can go wrong will go wrong' opening minutes of the film set the disoriented mode of the picture, and quite effectively. Your really not sure what's going on, where the movie is going, or even really what its about. There is a bit of a Hitchcock flavor here, intentional, but not overwhelming, much like Charade. The plot is messy, confusing, but not that important, the films really about its mood, and how sequences are staged, and what old conventions to play with. A film enjoyable for its unpredictability, where the twists all make sense, but don't really make sense at the same time. Fun. ***