Tepid goings on here in a film that barely qualifies as a giallo, but I'm calling it that anyway. I wanted to see it because it's the last film of its type that Carrol Baker did before drifting into comedy, then moving on from the Italian film industry altogether.
In Trinidad, permanently sozzled Enrico Maria Salerno is saved from being mugged by a young fellow by the name of Alan. Grateful for this, Enrico offers drifter Alan a job and a place to stay. The job is fixing engines for boats Enrico rents out to tourists and the place to stay is Enrico's own private island, completely with much younger girlfriend, Princess!
Princess starts giving mixed signals right away by having a hissy fit about Enrico offering Alan a place to stay and not talking to Alan, but then also starts parading around in a dress and smiling. Enrico on the other hand is a hopeless alcoholic who is rather mental, a state made worse whenever he visits his ex-wife Carrol Baker, who runs a bar on the mainland.
With Enrico rolling about pissed on the hooch and pissed off, it's not long before Princess and Alan are bumping uglies, but then Princess seems to suffer the mood swings as regular as a metronome, so when Alan eventually asks her what she really wants, he learns that she wants him to kill Enrico. Plus, something about money being stashed somewhere.
This is an old school giallo to a certain extent, with folks cheating on each and scheming behind each other's backs. The problem is there's basically four characters in the film so despite the nudity there's not a hell of a lot going on and almost negligible blood-letting, so if you're signing yourself up for that you can just bail out right now.
That said, both Enrico Salerno and Carrol Baker are a lot of fun to watch as both of them are really good at playing burned-out, miserable characters. Salerno especially comes across as initially nice, but eventually reveals himself as a bitter, unstable man. Quite impressive.
Other than that the ending was just about the only part with any tension in it.
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