| In a nameless European
country, Inspector Ginco (Michel Piccoli) takes every precaution
to ensure that a $1,000,000 shipment of money reaches a local
bank. Despite having decoy armored trucks, the real one containing
the money is sidetracked to a marina where a masked career
thief, known only as Diabolik (John Phillip Law) steals the
whole truck by lifting up by an electric magnet and dropping
it into the water, where he dives in and retrieves the money.
In a long chase, Diabolik eludes the police by switching cars
with his mistress and partner-in-crime, Eva Kant (Marisa Mell)
who drives Diabolik back to his hideout, a remote cave in
a mountain side which has miles of underground passageways,
and their living quarters is a mod of various expensive designed
bought with their ill gotten money.
Having heard of the latest robbery
by the masked thief, the Minister of the Interior (Terry
Thomas) arranges for a press conference. But Diabolik and
Eva sneak into the conference disgused as reporters where,
using their flash bulbs on their camera, they set off some
'exhilarating gas'. When the Minister informs the press
of this latest theft and preaching to the reporters that
he is not to be made a fool of, the Minister is reduced
to just that when the gas reduces everyone in the room to
hysterical laughter, while Diabolik and Eva quietly leave
unnoticed.
Following the press conference,
Inspector Ginco attempts to resign. But his boss (Claudio
Gora) refuses to accept his resignation. Ginco reluctantly
agrees to stay on the police force, and is subsequently
put in charge of the current plan to put all criminals behind
bars. With tireless precision, Ginco and his men clean up
the city. Mobsters are put behind bars, and then executed.
When a drug den is raided, the jaded hippies and drug addicted
are carted off.
Ralph Valmont (Adolfo Celi),
the head of a large crime syndicate which is responsible
for most of the murders and drug trafficking in the country,
learns about the raid on one of his establishments, and
makes contact with Inspector Ginco. In exchange for his
life, Valmont promises to help Ginco capture Diabolik.
When the visiting British finance
minister and his wife are honored at a gala party in a large
castle by the beach, the press, encouraged by Ginco, play
up the wifes recent acquisition of a rare emerald necklace,
which is to be unveiled at the celebration. Ginco knows
that Diabolik will not pass up the chance to steal the valuable
jewelry, so he and his men lay in wait all around the castle
for Diabolik to show up. Diabolik does show up, by scaling
the seaside wall of the castle to the living quarters of
the finance minister's wife where he steals the necklace,
and makes another clever escape by constructing a makeshift
catapult, but tricks Gino and the police into thinking he
used it to eject himself to safety, when he really hides
underneath it and simply walks out of the castle dressed
as a policeman.
Meanwhile, Valmont and henchmen
recognize Eva at an Esso filling station, and they kidnap
her. After making contact with Diabolik though a local newspaper,
he promises to hand over the emerald necklace in exchange
for Eva. Valmont wants to meet Diabolik aboard his private
airplane. The following evening, Diabolik meets with Valmont's
henchmen who herd him aboard Valmont's plane which takes
off. But it is revealed that this is all part of Ginco's
plan for once the plane reaches a destined spot, Valmont
is to release a trap door on his plane which will literally
drop Diabolik into the inspector's lap. But the plan backfires
greatly when Diabolik figures out what is going on and in
the subsequent shoot-out aboard the plane, Diabolik frees
Eva, and he and Valmont stuggle in which they fall through
the trapdoor, but Diabolik leaves behind a bomb which explodes,
killing all of Valmont's henchmen. The three of them parachute
to safely on the ground near the police rendezvous spot
where in a continuation shoot-out, Diabolik kills Valmont
by shooting him before apparently committing suicide when
Ginco and the police close in on him.
Ginco is saddened by Diabolik's
death for he never got the chance to really arrest him.
But Diabolik is not dead. During the shoot-out he took a
drug which slowed down his heart and matabolsim to the point
where he appeared dead. At the mourge, Eva, disguised as
a nurse, arrives and administrates the antidote. Diabolik
awakens, and kills the coroner before making his escape.
Unaware of Diabolik's most recent
escape, Gino is puzzled over the missing emeralds. Upon
reading Valmont's death certificate, an idea puzzles him.
All totaled, there are eleven emeralds missing. Valmont
died form eleven bullet wounds. Ginco realizes that Diabolik
is clever enough to use the jewels as bullets, therby proving
a very safe hiding place for them. Ginco runs over to the
crematorium to inspect Valmont's ashes. Diabolik, disguised
as Valmont's elderly brother, has already arrived to lay
claim to his brother's ashes. When the morgue attendant
begins to scoop the ashes into a urn, he is shocked to find
the emeralds. But before he can do anything, Diabolik knocks
him out, and makes his escape with the emeralds. As usual,
Ginco arrives at the morgue missing Diabolik by a matter
of seconds.
With no other alternatives open,
the police offer a $1 million rewards to anybody to is able
to lead them to Diabolik, Ginco realizes the foolishness
of this plan, but his superiors refuse to listen him because
of his string of bad luck in trying to catch Diabolik. Soon
after, Diabolik sends a note to the government saying: "in
view of the bad use of the government is making of the public's
money, I shall take steps to remove it from circulation."
In a matter of days, he blows up all tax offices, federal
banks, and treasury buildings to smithereens. The former
Minister of the Interior, now working as the Minister of
Finance, makes another comic appearance on television where
he reveals that with the destruction of the tax offices,
the tax records of all citizens have been destroyed. He
employs everybody to come forward voluntarily and pay the
tax they think they owe. His speech elicts nothing but more
laughter from the TV viewers.
With the government now strapped
for money, Ginco decides to put one last plan into action.
He has the entire gold reserve melted down into a 20-ton
ingot so that it can make up for the lost taxes. Yet he
realizes that Diabolik is going to attempt to steal it too.
Rather than be outwitted again, Ginco has the container
of the gold partially 'radio activated'. In this way, once
it is stolen, he will he able to use radioactive detectors
to lead them to Diabolik's hideout, and leading him to all
of Diabolik's stolen goods.
The next day, the ingot is duly
stolen by Diabolik who sabatoges the train carrying it by
blowing up a railroad bridge, in which the railroad car
containing the large ingot falls into the river. Diabolik
and Eve, donning wet suites, then use inflatable underwater
balloons to transport the large container though an underwater
passage to their hideout.
At Diabolik's hideout, he dons
a protective heat suit and plans to melt down the gold into
gold bricks. But as he's doing so, Ginco and his men follow
their radiation tracker devices to the underground lair
and make their entry. For the first time, Diabolik is caught
off-guard by the advancing police, but not entirely unprepared
as he decides to flood the entire cavern therby destroying
himself and everyone in it. But unaware that the ingot container
is partly radioactive, Diabolik leaves his electric drill
on the container in which the extreme heat from the drill
makes the container glow red hot. Just as Diabolik is about
to pull a lever to flood the cavern, the container explodes,
showering him in molten gold.
The police are finally delighted
to have finally disposed of Diabolik, and allow reporters
and the public into Diabolik's cave to put on display Diabolik.
But Ginco is not at all pleased by the decision to display
the body, which now is a picturesque gold statue for the
general public. The police and workers begin to haul all
the stolen appliances and loot out of the cave. Later when
the cavern is now deserted and empty, Eva, who had earlier
fled at Diabolik's instance, comes out wearing a black funeral
dress to play her respects to her lover. Ginco appears and
places Eva under arrest, but allows her for a few minutes
alone with the body. When Ginco leaves for a minute, a distraught
Eva catches sight of Diabolik's still exposed left eye.
Amazingly, it winks at her. The protective suit he is wearing
has prevented him from being burned alive, though he is
now trapped in his gold shell. The inspector arrives to
take her away. Soon after they leave, a diabolical laugh
rings out in the dark, empty cave.
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