The Trial (Il Processo) Season 1 Episode 5 Recap & Review

Nicola Tomei

Episode 5 of Il Processo begins 10 months earlier with Elena confronting Linda about having Angelica followed. She coldly calls her a prostitute and Elena squirms in her seat over hearing this about her biological daughter.

Back in the present, Ruggero speaks to Linda about the lead he has to work on and shows her the incriminating photos of Elena. It turns out he was the one who took them.

When Elena returns home she too sees the photos courtesy of a laptop screen. Giovanni packs his things and demands the truth, and it’s here she admits that Angelica is her daughter and she’s the girl from the case. With her world crumbling down around her, Ruggero starts to find important clues for the case, including the audio footage from Tomei.

The court begins again and Ruggero takes the reigns, steering the investigation back over to Angelica rather than Linda. The wiretap he has suggests Tomei was there that night and he brings the next witness, Michela Dapporto, to the witness stand.

She talks about being a hostess and her role as a prostitute. Angelica told her she once had more than 30 clients and as Ruggero questions, is it not possible then that the killer was one of these other clients?

Elena starts cross-examining but as we see from flashbacks to Ruggero’s training, Michela’s ready for the questions. Although it’s not wholly truthful, Ruggero agrees to pay her off by feeding her the name of Nicola Tomei. This means Tomei will be called into the court-room for questions too.

With the session concluded for the day, a frazzled Elena struggles to keep herself composed. Outside, she waits for Ruggero and confronts him over Dapporto, believing that he paid her off. When she leaves, Ruggero phones his contact and tells him to keep tailing Stefano.

Elena decides to see Andreoli again after Francesca admits the truth that she was the one who revealed what happened with the cigarette butt. Needing crucial intel on Nicola Tomei, she recruits him to scout the man out. At the same time, Ruggero makes a deal with Monaco who agrees to pay him handsomely if Linda is freed.

The 20th February sees the ninth hearing begin. Nicola Tomei is called to the stand where Ruggero questions him over how he knew Angelica. He goes straight on the attack, accusing him of killing the young girl until Elena objects and tells the Judge to intervene.

As Elena starts her questioning we learn that Tomei visited Claudio late that night in his white van. He tells the court he loved Angelica and would not have killed her. He followed her because he wanted to be with the girl but when he found out Angelica was a prostitute he went after Claudio and blackmailed him. He was also the one who leaked the news about the escort business to the press and more importantly, he didn’t return to the party that night.

Ruggero meets his contact later that day and learns the Stefano is Angelica’s father but Elena’s name has been omitted from the files. Instead, he takes her out for drinks where they discuss the case together. Given Elena keeps calling her Angelica rather than her full name, it raises red flags in his mind. As she leaves, he decides to take a DNA swab from her glass in order to learn the truth about if she shares DNA with Angelica or not,which is where the episode ends.

With the pacing slowing down to a glacial crawl, Il Processo slams on the breaks and instead, delivers a lot more focus on the two lawyers rather than the case itself. A lot of the content we receive here feels like padding, and alongside the melodrama it takes 12 minutes of the 55 in this episode to even get to court after seeing Elena’s turmoil early on.

Hopefully this improves going forward but compared to the excellent opening few episodes, Il Processo has slowed right down now and is unfortunately sinking into mediocrity.