THE BRUTE

From the French, and after Simenon, is this shocker which involves the court trial of a blind deaf mute, monstrous in appearance, Jacques Vauthier, for the murder of a passenger aboard ship he was believed not to have known. The defense of his case, as it is undertaken by a modest man of great ability, returns to Vauthier's childhood, the emotional exclusion of his family and the hostility it engendered, the tender treatment of Solange- the servant girl- who was to marry him eventually, and the tutelage of Rodelec who discovered and developed the intellectual brilliance in the boy. And it is Deliot, the lawyer, who through intuitive deduction is able to destroy the assumption of guilt and break the confession of his client which is prompted by his love for and suspicion of his wife.... There's something to be said for euthanasia.