The Strange Vice of Mrs Wardh 1971

In Vienna, a maniac is killing women with a straight razor. Julie Wardh Edwige Fenech and her diplomat husband Neil Wardh Alberto de Mendoza return from New York City to restart their lives, and Julie had married Neil to escape her former lover Jean Ivan Rassimov, a relationship marked by a harsh, abusive dynamic. On their first night back, Julie receives a flower bouquet with a sinister note from Jean, foreshadowing the danger that lurks in their social circle.

At a high-society party, Julie’s friend Carol Brandt Conchita Airoldi introduces her Australian cousin George Corro George Hilton. George and Carol’s wealthy uncle have just died, leaving them as the sole heirs. George flirts with Julie, who is unhappy in her marriage to the neglectful Neil. Julie leaves the party after spotting Jean, but Jean confronts her outside, hinting at their shared past and offering to drive her home. Neil arrives and slaps Jean, who merely laughs and walks away.

After a lunch date arranged by Carol, Julie and George begin an affair, despite Julie’s initial reluctance. Julie receives an anonymous call from a blackmailer demanding 20,000 schillings not to tell Neil about the affair. Julie suspects Jean is behind it, and Carol insists on meeting the blackmailer in Julie’s apartment. Carol goes to Schönbrunn Palace Park, where she is murdered by a razor-wielding attacker.

Julie learns about Carol’s murder and urges the police to investigate Jean, but Jean has an airtight alibi. Julie is later attacked in the parking garage of her apartment building by a figure with a straight razor, but she escapes. After she tells Neil about the encounter, he arms himself with a handgun and orders her to take him to Jean’s residence. There, they discover Jean’s body in a bloody bathtub.

Terrified of staying in Vienna, Julie secretly leaves for Spain with George. Back in Vienna, one of the razor killer’s intended victims kills him in self-defense. Julie is relieved after reading in the newspaper that the dead killer was a stranger to her, but someone continues to stalk her in Spain and sends her a note signed “Jean,” causing her to have a nervous breakdown. When George goes to fetch a doctor, Julie is ambushed and knocked out by Jean, who has faked his death. He stages the kitchen to look like Julie has committed suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning. George and the doctor arrive to find Julie locked in the kitchen, and the doctor tries to save her as George calls for an ambulance.

At the police station, officers inform George and Neil, who has been summoned from Vienna, that Julie has died and that her death has been ruled a suicide. Neil angrily accuses George of murder, despite the latter’s alibi. George drives to a remote location to meet Jean, whom he hired to kill Julie. Jean demands his promised payment and a fake passport so that he can flee to Rio de Janeiro, but George shoots him dead and stages his death as a suicide to ensure that Jean can never testify against him.

George meets with Neil, and their car ride reveals that they conspired to murder Carol and Julie. Carol’s death makes George the sole inheritor of his uncle’s fortune, and Julie’s death yields a huge insurance payment for Neil to avoid bankruptcy. To provide each other alibis and shift suspicion onto the razor killer, Neil killed Carol in the park, and George tried to kill Julie in the parking garage, then hired Jean to kill her after the death of the razor killer.

Neil sees Julie standing on the side of the road, and he and George are suddenly pursued by police vehicles. While trying to evade the police, George and Neil drive off a cliff to their deaths. It is revealed that the doctor saved Julie, but the police faked her death to trick George and Neil into meeting, having grown suspicious when Carol’s death did not fit the razor killer’s modus operandi. Julie is consoled by the doctor as they drive away.