Helsinki. Bruno Rygseck is a decadent millionaire who stages parties at his mansion, and killed the cat of his aunt Amalia as a prank. Inspector Palmu is informed the next day that Bruno has been found dead, drowned in his giant swimming pool, allegedly after tripping on a soap on the ground. Palmu arrives with Detectives Kokki and Virta to the mansion, but concludes it was a murder based on the butler's testimony that the lights in the swimming pool room were turned off. Bruno's wife Alli is poisoned via a drink, and Palmu assumes it was intended for Bruno. Since her brother Aimo was forging Bruno's signatures to repay his debt, Airi agreed to go to Bruno's room. Airi's fiance Erik claims he killed Bruno, but Palmu disputes this. It turns out Amalia killed Bruno because he killed her cat, and uses Virta's pistol to attack Airi, but is arrested by Palmu's men.
The first film adaptation of the novels about Insector Palmu, "Inspector Palmu's Mistake" is a light crime comedy that works as some sort of a Finnish version of Agatha Christie or Inspector Columbo 'whodunnit' murder mystery, without adding anything specific or new to it. It is elegant and fun, albeit straightforward and lacking in surprises or humor, except for the funny "twist ending" as to what the motive was for the murder. Some of the plot points are more of strained ploys than true clues to solving the mystery (for instance, the only hint that Bruno's drowning in the swimming pool was murder is that the room's lights were switched off from the inside, which is overstretched). The most was achieved out of the leading actor Joel Rinne as the title Inspector, who is both competent and charismatic enough to carry the film even when objectively there isn't much happening on the screen. The best segment is when a group of friends make a bet at who will perpetrate the best misdemeanor without the victim having the guts to contact the police due to embarassment, so a woman feigns she fainted in front of a man, he takes her inside his apartment, but as he goes to the kitchen to get her some water, she "wakes up", steals his manuscript for the novel and escapes, while he is unable to tell anyone because "he could not explain to his mother what a foreign woman was doing in his apartment". A few dynamic camera drives, an occasional cinematic technique (Alli drinks the poisoned drink and falls down with the glass, as it dissolves to the same (later) frame of Palmu's shoes standing above said glass on the floor) and a couple of solid jokes, but otherwise a rather standard and at times overstretched little crime flick.
Grade:++
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