THE ANGEL OF TORREMOLINOS

Again, as in Port of Light (1987) and other outings for Madrid's Supt. Luis Bernal, there's virtually no mystery in this serviceable police-procedural--which takes the aging, portly Superintendent and his two favorite assistants to Torremolinos on the Costa del Sol. The cops' special mission: to prevent terrorist bombings by a band of fanatical Basque nationalists and, if possible, to capture these ruthless fanatics. So, while Bernal confers with local authorities, his sidekicks Angel (the handsome young Casanova) and Elena (the independent-minded heiress) go undercover in a tourist-trap hotel. Soon, however, Bernal becomes intrigued by another local disaster: the disappearance of a number of foreign tourists, all young men with little money and a yen for drugs. Are these missing youths linked to the terrorism? Or is a psycho-kidnapper (or killer) at work? Well, as the reader pretty much knows from the start, a loony serial-killer is indeed at work. And, by the end, Bernal will have both nabbed the terrorist ringleaders and trapped the murkily motivated psycho--thanks more to luck than fine police-work. Ho-hum plotting, somewhat redeemed by the picturesque background, the occasional action-sequences, and the slender continuing drama involving the private-lives of Angel, Elena, and Bernal (now determined to get a divorce and marry mistress Consuelo).