The Bloodstained Butterfly – 1971 – an atypical giallo

I haven’t watched any gialli lately. In fact, it was quite some years ago since I last was interested in these italian thrillers. But since I was giving Arrow Video a new chance (it’s a long story) I ordered The Bloodstained Butterfly without knowing the first thing about it. Except that the title was great and that it was some kind of giallo.

It wasn’t what I expected though. The Bloodstained Butterfly is a little too atypical for what I expected at least. In my mind gialli should consist of som nice stylish murders. There should be a story with lots of red herrings and a really far fetched solution to the murder mystery. The Bloodstained Butterfly doesn’t have any of that. There are very few murders and those that are there aren’t bloody at all. In fact, there’s hardly any blood in the movie and certainly not a killer in black gloves. You know the standard formula for a giallo.

Instead the story has a pretty logical solution to the events. The main investigator is not the police (sort of) and there are some surprises in the end. Maybe not as revolutionary as we’re used to in the typical giallo but quite enough. The way there is quite slow and I was under the impression that the film itself was a little bit longer than it really is. It felt like over two hours when it’s only about one and a half.

The bottom line is that I’m a bit disappointed with it but on the other hand I realize that this has a great craftsmanship in it. Not very entertaining I think but as it doesn’t flirt with any bloody scenes you have to consider it to be solid piece of work.