Eyewitness (Testimone Oculare) 1990

One of the last efforts of Italian horror director Lamberto Bava, this is a fairly standard thriller starring Barbara Cupisti as a blind eyewitness to a murder in a shopping complex. The beginning of the film shows Cupisti( Elisa) leave a mall after shopping for some lingerie. Since it is closing time, she sends her companion and helper Carl to take the car out of the parking lot while she pays for her items. However, even as she finds her way out, the entire complex is shut off.

Meanwhile, a staff at the mall is working late, completing some filing work. Her boyfriend Marcello slips into her room and the two engage in enthusiastic sex. However, the Director of the mall happens to be a sex pervert who sees the two from the window outside. He upsets a flower pot, and the staff, thinking it to be a watchman, ushers Marcello out and asks him to leave. Just then, the director gets hold of the girl and brutally rapes and then murders her. Elise is present at the crime scene and hears the staff's cry for help along with glass breaking( the director killer smashes the victim's head into a glass door after strangulating her with a leather whip). The police commissioner Marra doesn't trust her instincts, especially as she reveals herself to be blind, and is suspicious of Carl, who has a shady past criminal record, and as he happened to be found at the crime scene. He sends Carl for a blood test in order to check his blood with the blood found underneath the victim's nails. Elisa recounts to the commissioner that she felt the murderer pass close to her, and through her senses, she could deduce that it was a man who was assured in his steps and knew his way around the premises, thus suggesting that the killer worked in the complex. Although seemingly crucial, Marra disregards her statement as emanating from a person whose evidence would never be considered since Elisa has seen nothing. Elisa also tells Marra that she and Karl both stay in a community for handicapped persons, and that they manage to live independent, structured lives without much dependence on anyone.
 
The real killer is also brought to the commissioner's office for questioning, and although the police are unable to elicit any information from him, he learns of the presence of a eyewitness. He however mistakenly identifies the District Attorney Tiziana as the eyewitness, and then follows her to the hotel where she has a night shift protecting Elisa. Tiziana is murdered in the same manner as the earlier victim, first being violated, then strangulated. Elisa discovers the body and since  Carl was present again at the scene ( he escaped from the hospital where he was taken for the blood test in order to be near and protect Elisa), the police enlist him as a suspect, and Elisa as her confederate. In between all these actions, Marra and Elisa develop feelings for each other, and he is reluctant to admit her as a confederate to Karl in his alleged murders.

However, he and the police force begin searching for Karl, now more than suspicious of his role in the crimes. Elisa tries to warn Karl off against the police, and in the process Karl is murdered viciously by the store manager/real killer, who has followed Elisa to her secret rendezvouz  with Karl.

With Karl's death, his name is cleared from the murders of the two women, and Marra asks Elisa to return to her community since there had already been two attempts on her life, and in any case since she is blind, she could be of no possible use to him. The killer follows her there, disguised as a person with double glaucoma. Elisa instantly recognises him through his voice and his facial features( she had earlier examined his face at the dockyard where Karl was attacked and killed). She says nothing of her fears to Marra, but takes matters into her own hands. Trying to distract the killer by seducing him, another blind woman sprays acid to his face, and thereafter other handicapped persons bludgeon him to death with their wheelchairs and canes. Marra, who had earlier been to the killer's home and seen his disturbing toys and leather whip, is convinced that the store manager is a disturbed psychotic sex pervert who is responsible for the murders, and reaches the community just in time to see the killer's body. In the final scene, Marra and Elise reunite as Marra formally closes investigation into the case.

This is quite a difficult movie to procure, and available only on a limited DVD edition. Although I would be inclined to categorise this as a giallo film, the difficulty lies in the fact that the identity of the killer is disclosed with the very first murder, and there are no red herrings thrown in by the director to confuse the viewer. The story plays out as straightforward as possible, showing both the hunter and the hunted in a race against time to expose the other. The performance of Barbara Cupisti as the blind eyewitness is commendable, and the music is soft and pleasant. Go ahead and watch it if you manage to locate a copy.