These German Krimi movies, based on the stories of Edgar Wallace, are by definition infamous for their convoluted and hectic screenplays, but with its numerous twists and turns "The Devil's Daffodil" truly is the cinematic equivalent of a pretzel! You won't hear me say this is the greatest movie ever made, but there is plenty of exiting stuff going on and you won't get bored for a second. The film literally opens with a double bang, namely the vicious murder of an exotic dancer in her dressing room and the explosion of a discovered drug cargo in the customs' office. The two events are undoubtedly related, since the drugs were hidden in the stems of daffodils and the killer threw a handful of flowers on victim's body; - also daffodils. The murder streak continues, with daffodil-covered corpses popping up all over London, and Scotland Yard teams up with an odd Chinese super-detective. Excellent cast, with Krimi-regulars Joachim Fuchsberger and Klaus Kinski, and the unsurpassable Christopher Lee depicting yet another Oriental character (what he also did in "Terror of the Tongs" and a handful of "Fu Manchu" movies). There's much less sinister atmosphere than in other Krimi movies I recently watched, but the pacing is good and there are gruesome & inventive death sequences. The mandatory comic relief is also missing here, unless you consider Lee's recurring line "There's an old Chinese saying..." as comical.
Review of The Devil's Daffodil
