"It happened on broad daylight" (1958) was the first Swiss series-killer movie. In the Canton of Zurich, little blond girls are killed. The villagers suspect the peddler Jacquier (Michel Simon) who is arrested by the police and hangs himself up in his cell. Chief-commissioner Matthaei (Heinz Rühmann) is convinced that the peddler was innocent. In the drawings of Gritli, the last killed little girl, he finds little hedgehogs, a puppet, a black car and a strange animal with horns. He recognizes that all murder cases happened along the street that leads to the Canton of Grisons. From an Italian, he rents a gas station along this street and engages as his housekeeper a women whose little daughter Annemarie strongly resembles the murdered Gritli. One evening, Annemarie is late back home and tells that she met a huge "sorcerer" who gave her chocolates that resemble hedgehogs. On his car there is a number tag with the ibex, the heraldic figure of the Grisons. The film shows parallel the rich Mr. Schrott alias the "sorcerer" (Gert Fröbe) suppressed by his wife (Berta Drews). Matthaei asks Annemarie when she will meet the "sorcerer" again and goes instead of her in the forest. At the meeting-place he lays down a blond-haired puppet. While Matthaei hides himself, the "sorcerer" appears and thinks that Annemarie was killed. He cries out in his insanity and sees Matthaei, assuming that he is the murderer and tries to kill him. But Matthaei's police men are already ready to protect their boss and arrest the "sorcerer".
Review of It Happened in Broad Daylight
