Poliziotteschi Films and Other Italian Exploitation

My experience is limited, but I own and quite enjoy Violent Professionals, The Cynic, The Rat, and The Fist, Emergency Squad, Syndicate Sadists, and Beast With A Gun. None of the them are what I would call brilliant, but there's enough gnash n' smash chutzpah in them to give you a good time. VP and BWAG are the most accomplished, and SS is the absolute fucking silliest (a little trivia, Tomás Milián's character in SS was named Rambo because at the time, '74 - '75, he had attempted to get a First Blood film off the ground to no success, so he snagged the name for this otherwise unrelated film).

There may be a film I have that I'm forgetting, but I'll have to come back to it later.

Edit: SS, on top of being a buffet of sub-retarded fun, and making practically no sense at all from moment to moment, features, in a small role, an aged and hardcore slumming Joseph Cotten, who looks as if he wants to keel over and die with every withered line of dialogue that escapes his mummy-like lips. Hard to believe he didn't kick it until 1994, as he's basically a hair's breadth away from being a zombie in Syndicate Sadists.

Widescreen prints of THE CYNIC, THE RAT AND THE FIST, ROME ARMED TO THE TEETH (a.k.a. BRUTAL JUSTICE, ASSAULT WITH A DEADLY WEAPON) and VIOLENT NAPLES (a.k.a. VIOLENT PROTECTION) can be had in this set:

http://www.amazon.com/Mafia-Kingpin-...8226065&sr=1-1

At $6.98 it's a great deal. Plus you get MISTER SCARFACE and COP IN BLUE JEANS!

The quality of Mr Scarface and Cops in Blue Jeans is horrible on that dvd and I had a problem with the second disc (contains the other three films but are a much better quality) skipping if i happened to pause it. No Subs, just dubbed and i think they've been cut. Still, for the price it's worth it as they are enjoyable B-movies with some cool car chases and Tomas Milian rocks.

His character, Nico Giraldi of Cop in Blue Jeans is a wonderful creation, he worships Serpico and never takes his clothes off in bed even when shagging a bird due to growing up poor and being scared of the electricty being turned off in the middle of the night. Milian just makes you think "fair enough".

The story behind Maurizio Merli is a funny one. I think he's ok but he does throw a limp punch and unfortunately punches anyone that stands in front of him. The films are highly misogynist (part of the fun), it doesn't matter what your occupation is, if your female, you're going to get smacked about and reveal a bit of tit at an inappropriate time. Really, i thought the Merli films that are present on the dvd were very similar to each other.

I've read that Hired to Kill (The italian Connection/Black Kingpin) is a very strong crime film. That's next on my list.

I got into this genre about a year or so ago... Fernando Di Leo's 'Manhunt' is hard to beat in my humble opinion http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0068902/

But my favourite is 'Milano Calibro 9' also by Di Leo... get 'em both on fine looking Region 2 dvds here!

http://www.rarovideo.com/default.asp...eto%20italiano

or this boxset from the same guys here

http://www.rarovideo.com/schedaTitol...eto%20italiano

I would also say give 'Contraband', Lucio Fulci's ultra gory take on the genre, a spin and Enzo Castellari's 'Street Law', with Franco Nero is also rather excellent. I think they are both on Blue Underground DVD.

Blue Underground used to go on about releasing what many consider one of the high points in the genre on DVD, Castellari's 'High Crime'... sadly has never happened... a decent DVD release for the brilliant 'Violent Naples' is also badly needed.

Oh yeah, almnost forgot Umberto Lenzi's amazing 'Almost Human'...NoShame DVD put out a strong version of this nasty flick but it is now OOP and selling at a higher price on Amazon,

http://www.amazon.com/Almost-Human-T...8493370&sr=1-1


Not having crossed over to the Blu side I am not sure what is going on there...I imagine Blu Underground will slowly release most of their titles on the format at some point.

I also have these cds that I highly recommend if any of the fucking funky tunes take your fancy as you work your way through the genre!

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_ss_...&sprefix=poliz

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Beretta-70-V...8493938&sr=1-1

and....

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Napoli-Viole...8493979&sr=1-1

CONTRABAND and RICCO, THE MEAN MACHINE, those were the ones I was forgetting. CONTRABAND is cool, and almost lives up to its reputation. RICCO would be better if Christopher Mitchum wasn't such a complete void of charisma.

Also, there is a scene in SS that the cover is based on, but yeah, it's nothing like what's represented.

The scene in the disco where the entire beginning of the scene is shot with a strobe light on is alone worth the price for Contraband.

I can second this, fun movie with a great soundtrack. Slightly more thoughtful than the average vigilante flick (I said "slightly", don't expect Watchmen), Nero hamming it up like no tomorrow and a great opening sequence featuring various heinous CRIMES being commited.

^ Yeah, I really like that one... and you are right, it is a little more thoughtful; except when Nero starts slapping his wife Barbara Bach about!

Gotta stress the greatness of 'Milano Calibro 9' again... this clip is the start of the movie and is about 7 mins, but it really is a damned fine start to any film and the music is fantastic... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHz8r...eature=related

I was thinking more "thoughtful" in the sense that it actually engages with some of the more obvious consequences of vigilanteism - the fact that the cops will not be on your side, the desperate uselessness of it all.

Phil, don't really know what to tell ya - I like Street Law quite a lot but it's certainly trashy. Exploitation cinema is of course pretty hit-or-miss by nature, what with the ridicolous productivity and everything, but I think Castellari has a better batting average than most. Not that such things matter all that much, but you might also want to check out Street Law for historical reasons; it was released at the same time as Death Wish, Castellari got called a fascist by the leftist press over it, etc. so you could view it as a landmark film of sorts.

Yeah I think Corbucci did pretty much nothing but comedies during the 70's, which is a shame because during the spaghetti western era he was one of the very best. Can't imagine a card carrying communist like Corbucci getting too enamoured of such a fundamentally right-wing genre, either.

I picked up this little book years ago when I was first getting into this genre.Lots of good reviews .It even uses little J&B bottles as page numbers..Fun read

http://www.fabpress.com/perl/search.pl?CO=SP122

^ book's essential...

Glad you took the time to watch that opening to Milano Calibro 9 Phil... brilliant stuff in that film.


Colt 38 Special Squad is certainly up there too in my humble...

You worked for Independent International?

Not to derail the thread, but I ordered Keoma based on the appreciation for it in the Spaghetti Western thread and it arrived yesterday. I'm also going to order Django, Kill! I've got Keoma waiting to be popped into my PS3 for viewing.

That's really cool. You must have some interesting stories, even if you were there only for a short time. I've enjoyed a number of things Sherman distributed (especially FRANKENSTEIN'S BLOODY TERROR), and I love the man's audio commentaries.

Sorry to derail, everyone.

I will not allow this thread to fade sir, check out 'The Big Racket' and 'The Heroin Busters' as well if you can... I found this stuff easy to slip into because of my love of Gialli and Italian Horror; buut give it time and I guarantee you can stick one of these bad boys on and have a great time with a few unsuspecting friends.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYXA5...eature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GpIQ2cK9II

Enjoy 'em, sir!

Just bought this for myself for Chrimbo

http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?im...a%3DN%26um%3D1

I've been putting off Sollima's work and now I'm kicking myself! Thanks for the review.

Thanks for posting that, Phil! A few of us in the B-thread were raving about Revolver, but you sum up the charms better than anyone.

Did you get around to Violent City? Vintage Bronson. I like it even more.

As you said, not sure if it counts, but Superfuzz is a gas. I'm on the hunt now for a copy.

Great stuff reading about your take on Revolver, Phil... definitly give Milano Calibro 9 a chance in it's original language version (although you don't need subs to enjoy Bouchet's go-go dance!)... I coughed up for the Italian release from raro video, great print and a cheap dvd too.

Will have to go back and give it another watch regarding the possible actor switcheroo; I dont remember noticing anything odd the couple of times I've watched it tho'.

Hope you like Street Law... it really is a helluva lot of fun.

By the way, even though this is old news on Twitch, I only just heard about this upcoming doc. If you don't already know about it check out this lengthy trailer for it... looks like fun with John Saxon, Henry Silva, Nero et al. talking about the good times!

http://twitchfilm.net/news/2009/06/n...rime-films.php

Didn't know about this, just that it was supposed to have come out by the end of the year; and you're right, the trailer does look shoddy and not particularly well put together... but I bet there are some great tales to be told by some of those legends they interviewed. I hope someone releases those in some form at some point (they'd be great features on special edition DVDs if someone wanted to use them)

I thought Street Law was ok, nothing more. Casteralli has made a good looking and stylish film, the car chases and action scenes are shot well and he certainly knows how to use slow-motion to full effect(it's almost balletic) but it falls short due to the story. I don't expect much from the genre but I want to at least care about it.
Nero is quality, he puts his all into the role as expected but it's hard to feel empathetic towards him when he really brings his troubles all on himself, his reaction to being slighted just feels overblown and ludicrous, I didn't particularly care for his burgeoning relationship with the criminal either.
The first 15 mins really are outstanding, the freeze frames during the credit sequence and lengthy car chase after the bank robbery along with the catchy tune got me all excited and just set the bar to high for what follows after.

I'm not a fan of Contraband too. I caught that last year and apart from the climatic shoot-out, I found it to be ploddingly dull. Casting Fabio Testi as the lead without any intersting/scene stealing support doesn't do it any favours.

You can get a Thailand release of Almost Human on ebay for a decent price.

Also, has anybody seen Ruggero Deodato's contribution to the genre, Live Like A Cop, Die Like A Man?

You're right about all of this, but it's actually part of why I liked the movie - I'm not immune to the glorified vigilante plot in fiction, but it was kinda refreshing to see a movie that's more cynical about the concept, willing to acknowledge that anyone who actually does shit like that is probably not too stable and more than likely to get shot over it. There is also something so gloriously latin macho about Nero's (completley overblown, I agree!) reaction - it's total spaghetti western logic, they insulted his mule.

I guess what I'm saying is the movie isn't entirely uncritical of its main character's motivation, or at least intelligent enough to let you put it into question. Which is kinda having it both ways because at the same time it's totally about cheering for Franco Nero as he goes ballistic, so I suppose my defense might be a bit have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too, but hey, it works for me.

I have no idea whether this is actually gonna get released or whatever, but I'd go see it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=La0YX...os=O7eqEHvgDeg

I'm watching REVOLVER right now. This movie is great. Best poliziotteschi film I've seen so far (which isn't many, but still)

What the fuck did I do?

Oh, pffft. Movie was paused.

See Seee Seeee? It's not me!

Btw, is Revolver out in Blu?

Ah but I wasn't watching in installments. It was the equivalent of pausing to go to the bathroom.