AllMovie

This detective drama explores the labyrinthine byways of the Sicilian and Italian mind when confronted with ancient family secrets and treasures in the course of a murder investigation. In the story, an eminent diplomat returns unexpectedly to his remote villa near a small Sicilian town to hunt for some correspondence between his family members and the famous Italian historical figures, Pirandello and Garibaldi. While there, he calls the police, but before they can get around to seeing him, he has been killed. After that, every step they make towards solving his murder leads them deeper into complications. The two feuding policemen on the case (Ricky Tognazzi and Ennio Fantastichinni) are forced to call on a professor Gian Maria Volontè) for help in unraveling the tangled threads from the past which connect to the murder. This intricate whodunit is based on a celebrated novella by Leonardo Sciascia).