Review of Der Todesrächer von Soho

"Der Todesrächer von Soho" (and there are several English titles for this one that I won't list) is a West German 75-minute movie from 1972, so this one will have its 45th anniversary next year. The star here is possibly the director Jesús Franco, who is still very known today, mostly for his trashy horror films. This one is a bit of that too, even if there are no supernatural aspects here and the focus is mostly on police investigation. Franco is also one of several people who worked on the script. The two lead actors are Horst Tappert, still very known in Germany today because of "Derrick", and Fred Williams, who is not known here anymore today. The latter played the good guy, even if he was almost too nice for the role, while Tappert plays a character where you never knew if he was good or bad, except at the ending. The female characters are written pretty badly again, but that's a common problem from the 1970s. I personally did not enjoy the watch too much. I believe Tappert elevated the material on some occasions, but it was a fairly weak film overall. The base material here is by Bryan Edgar Wallace, son of Edgar, who followed in his father's footsteps, but this film is mostly an appendix as the Wallace film series was pretty much over in the 1970s. I give this one a thumbs-down and I am glad it was over so quickly, even if it still dragged despite only 1hour and 15 minutes. Thumbs down.