Kriminal (1966) User Reviews

KRIMINAL (Umberto Lenzi, 1966) **1/2

[Bunuel1976 · 6/10 · 14 June 2006]

Fun caper which anticipated Mario Bava's DANGER: DIABOLIK (1968) - which I rewatched the very next day via Paramount's SE DVD - but isn't nearly as stylish! Glenn Saxson is a wooden lead (I should be watching him again soon in a Spaghetti Western, DJANGO SHOOTS FIRST [1966]), though Helga Line' - in a dual role! - is an attractive foil. Raymond Full's score is infectious and appropriately playful, while Angelo Lotti's pleasing cinematography takes in picture-postcard views of London, Madrid and Istanbul.

Still, even though Kriminal's skeletal costume may work on paper (the film originated as a comic-strip), it feels rather silly when displayed on the screen - and, ultimately, has been infrequently used! The film, however, creates some pretty exciting set-pieces (including the ruse of exchanged identity towards the end) and even concludes with a nice twist, opening the way for an eventual sequel - which arrived in the form of IL MARCHIO DI KRIMINAL (1968)...

The Superhero Who Glows in the Dark!

[Coventry · 7/10 · 7 November 2010]

"Kriminal" explodes immediately with awesome, mega-cool opening credits. They're half comic-book and half live-action, guided by a gloriously psychedelic and rhythmic tune. This is an anti-(super-)hero movie in the same vein as Mario Bava's "Danger: Diabolik", and that just happens to be one of my favorite movies of all time. It's colorful, swinging, boisterous and just downright ecstatic! The plot is convoluted and you have to remain quite alert to keep up with all the plot twists. Glenn Saxson, who sometimes looks like he could be the twin brother of Franco Nero, plays the title role. He's a masked anti-hero who kills in the most incredible and imaginative ways. He seduces old horny women and subsequently boils them in their own saunas paid by they money they inherited after the suspicious death of their husbands. Kriminal is also a regular David Copperfield! He makes the best exits and I never saw someone vanish in the crowd without being noticed like he does. Last but not least, Kriminal wears the coolest outfit ever. He's dressed like a skeleton. That looks reasonably creepy and it glows in the dark, which comes in quite handy during his nocturnal escapades. Screw Batman and Spiderman, the Kriminal skeleton is the way to go! It's a bit of a shame that this film isn't more commonly known, because the outfit would make a terrific costume for kids to wear on Halloween. Speaking of which, I wouldn't be too surprised if Kriminal's outfit stood model for the character of Jack Skeleton in Tim Burton's "The Nightmare Before Christmas". Too bad the outfit is criminally – pun intended – underused. Considering the time of release, the film is also stuffed with obligatory James Bond imitations, like sequences set inside casinos and villainous characters that resemble Ernst Blofeld. Luckily enough the script is solid and intelligent enough to stand alone as an independent success, full of action, humor and lewdness. Director Umberto Lenzi might be most commonly known for his repulsive cannibal flicks ("Cannibal Ferox", "Nightmare City") and excessively violent cop thrillers ("Almost Human", "Violent Naples"), but this rarely seen so- called crime caper is definitely worth seeking out.

fantastically decorated 1966 minor gem

[christopher-underwood · 7/10 · 20 February 2014]

From the stylish comic book style credits at the beginning we know this is not to be taken too seriously and that a good time could be had. And indeed it is. Nothing too special but a slight story involving the theft of some jewels is much enlivened by Lenzi's enthusiastic direction. Everything, from the skeleton like costume the 'Kriminal' dons to the fine costumes worn by the great Helga Line (in a double role) and the wonderful London and Istanbul location photography, this keeps happily moving in its own colourful way from start to finish. So outlandish and likable in parts that this is laugh out loud funny at times and there is certainly never a dull moment as our dashing hero seduces, deduces, makes time for a little lovemaking and crucially when the situation demands, kills. All action, all smiles fantastically decorated 1966 minor gem from one of Italy's most able directors.

Stylier than James Bond,

[realmovieseeker · 19 May 2002]

True to the comic, Obviously noir, The story is of a Robber "Kriminal", who dresses like a skeleton and goes out ot steal diamonds, etc... Being this is an Italian from the 60's, it's full of style, with a linear, and especially very, very very Smooth plotline. This movie is full of double crosses, and everything a typical spionage had back in the day. I recommend it

Kriminal:Issue 1.

[morrison-dylan-fan · 6/10 · 11 July 2012]

Originally hearing about the short lived Italian "Komic-book" sub-genre of films in connection with Mario Bava's Danger Diabolik and the at the time heavily cut Baba Yaga, (1968 and 1973-both also reviewed)I was surprised to find out,that unlike those one "issues",a comic book character called Kriminal had not one,but two movie adaptations.

Checking for details about the first adaptation,I was delighted to discover that the first movie was written and directed by the wonderful Umberto Lenzi,which led to me getting set to see Lenzi's superhero go on a thrilling adventure.

View on the film:

Using the last 30 minutes of the movie to solely focus on Kriminal (dashingly played by Glenn Sazson) himself,Umberto Lenzi and David Moreno's screenplay change's the film from being a "komic book" movie into becoming a rather enjoyable man on the run thriller,as Kriminal attempts to stay ahead of the gathering momentum police by crossing the boarders of Istanbul and Madrid in any way possible,which includes jumping around on top of a moving train!,in a excitingly done action set piece.

Sadly,before the movie cuts to the chases,the first hour of Lenzi and Moreno's script becomes a tangled mess due to being filled with overly complex,underwritten back stabbings and betrayals,causing the excitement of Kriminal's heist to completely defuse.

Prominently using Romano Mussolini's lively Jazz Score,Umberto Lenzi leaves most of his fantastic scatter-shot directing style behind,to instead give the movie a much more artful art deco appearance,which along with making the beautiful Helga Line shimmer in her double role as twins Inga and Trude,also shows the Istanbul and Madrid locations in a cleverly done mix of wide,brightly lit action set pieces,and down to earth,fading art- deco,low-lit moments that show Kriminal trying to lay low,as he begins to wonder if he has finally met his match.

Super-cool character...who does not much of anything!

[udar55 · 4/10 · 20 February 2012]

After escaping a hanging for stealing the British Royal Crown, mysterious super-thief Kriminal (Glenn Saxson) sets his sights on some jewels being taken from London to Istanbul. Everything goes smoothly until he subdues the courier (Helga Liné) and finds out her jewel box is empty. He figures out that the owners were looking to swindle the insurance company, so he heads to Turkey to blackmail them and also steal the real jewels if at all possible. Close on his heels is Inspector Milton (Andrea Bosic).

Oh man, Umberto Lenzi adapting a popular Italian comic character who dresses like a skeleton? Filmed widescreen in England and Istanbul? This has to rock, right? Uh, no. While watching this I realized around the one hour mark that I'd heard a lot of talk about diamonds, but very little actual action. It isn't until the 70 minute mark that the plan goes into effect and is laughable at best, relying on a bank actually letting a guy enter their safe deposit box vault with his head wrapped in bandages. What I was hoping would be in the vein of DANGER: DIABOLIK (1968) ended up being more along the lines of very dry Bond knockoff. One problem is there is very little action that one would expect. A car chase? Hell, a foot chase? Nope. The Kriminal costume is very cool, but he only wears it three times throughout the movie and never during actual robberies, just when he likes to creep up on women. This is the film's other major problem as Kriminal is a pretty mean character, even for an anti-hero. I figure the filmmakers want you to root for him, but it is hard when he slaps women around and tries to blow up his ex-wife. Saxson is handsome as the lead, looking a bit like Richard Harrison. He returned in the sequel THE MASK OF KRIMINAL (1968) a couple of years later.

I've seen worse

[jrd_73 · 5/10 · 5 April 2011]

Watchable entry in the super-criminal subgenre even if it is a far cry from Danger: Diabolik. This film begins with Kriminal escaping execution and quickly planning a diamond heist. Since the diamonds have already been stolen, Kriminal is essentially swindling criminals. This doesn't necessarily make him a good guy, what with trying to blow up his ex-wife who turned stool pigeon. Still, Kriminal has charm. . . and a nifty skeleton suit for nocturnal adventures. An all black suit might have been more practical for blending into the darkness but Kriminal is anything if stylish. The film itself could have used more style. Umberto Lenzi's direction is merely serviceable, lacking the thrills of some of the director's 70's crime movies. On the plus side, the film offers bright cinematography and appealing eye candy provided by Helga Line and Mary Arden (Blood and Black Lace).

Kriminal is not a film that stays long in the memory but offers a pleasant enough lazy afternoon viewing.

Boring Italian action film

[entomol71 · 5/10 · 1 August 2010]

Kriminal, a famous English thief, whose actual identity nobody knows, steals some diamonds of Lady Gold, a rich English woman. While he is leaving England by train, the police tries to capture him and he loses the diamonds jumping out of the train. After some hours walking he meets a beautiful woman who gets him a passage with her car. But she is a policewoman… This is a boring Italian film inspired to a famous comic strip called precisely "Kriminal". I think it is more interesting than the film although the film is rather faithful as for the characters and Kriminal's costume is the same of the comic strip.

Filmed in England and in Turkey it has a good soundtrack even if it is very similar to "Flashman" another Italian B action film. Among these kind of films it is worth remembering "Diabolik" that is the best in my opinion. Kriminal has original dialogues some in Italian and some in English then dubbed for the Italian market. By the way Glenn Saxon who plays Kriminal, is a Holland actor overall famous in Italy for some Italian westerns. In the role of a police superintendent we recognize Franco Fantasia who is a good Italian stuntman.

Very cool crime caper from Umberto Lenzi

[The_Void · 8/10 · 23 June 2008]

Umberto Lenzi is best known for his gory zombie flicks, Giallo's and Italian Cop movies; but there are a few gems from other genres dotted around his filmography, and Kriminal is definitely one of the best of them! The film is based on a comic book and follows the fortunes of a 'cartoon' criminal out to steal whatever he can. The obvious film to compare this to would be Mario Bava's pulp fiction thriller 'Diabolik', although this one is (slightly) more grounded in reality and while it doesn't have the comic book grandeur of Bava's later effort; all in all, I wouldn't hesitate to call Kriminal a better film. Glenn Saxson takes the lead role as 'Kriminal' - a notorious yet incognito thief who wears a skeleton suit and somehow manages to get the better of the police every time they try to stop him from stealing. The plot starts properly when an opportunity to steal a large amount of diamonds from a safe deposit box in Instanbul presents itself. Kriminal masterminds a plot to liberate the jewels; but first has to worm his way into several people's affections.

The film has a great comic book style and Umberto Lenzi effortlessly manages to give the film a real stylish verve that benefits the plot immensely. Glenn Saxson might not be a great actor, but he fits the bill as the title character and actually looks like he might be a drawing from a comic book himself! The film features Kriminal wearing a suit painted as a skeleton; although unfortunately this part of the film doesn't come off as being as cool as it could have been; but it does give the film an extra interesting element. There are plenty of characters to move the plot along, and while the plotting does get a little confusing at times; it's generally interesting enough. Lenzi manages some really beautiful locations and he definitely gets the best out of 'high society' in Istanbul. There are also a number of lovely ladies on display, which is always a bonus too! There's no real point to the film; but the ending is good enough and the film finishes in a 'fun' way. Overall, I'm not surprised that this isn't one of Lenzi's better known films - but it's certainly not a bad one and I highly recommend seeing it...if you can find it!

No action + overly serious = no fun

[Leofwine_draca · 4/10 · 14 August 2016]

An unlikely cross between two of the hottest crime-fighters of the '60s – TV's Batman and cinema's James Bond – KRIMINAL is in fact a film based on a popular Italian comic strip. The twist is that our hero isn't a hero at all, instead a fully-fledged bad guy, a thief whose ideal pastime is to steal jewels and make tons of money from his criminal exploits. Along the way, there's time for plenty of romance a la Bond as Kriminal wanders around and takes advantage of a succession of beautiful women. It all sounds pretty good and, being made in the '60s, it's absolutely loaded with style in everything from the music to the fashions on display. But there's something detached and routine about this film that stopped me from enjoying it one bit.

I'll admit that the genre of Italian spy movies left me somewhat cold. I didn't mind early Bond films – GOLDFINGER is a classic – but the slavish devotion of the countless rip-offs I found utterly boring. Now the Italian superhero movies of the late '60s – this was much more to my liking. Outlandish good guys like Argoman, Superargo and the Three Fantastic Supermen would bound around on screen and tackle waves of bad guys with knowing smirks and plenty of panache. I was hoping KRIMINAL would be like the latter films, but this is really a Bond-style movie masquerading as a superhero flick. It's an interesting precursor to Mario Bava's DANGER DIABOLIK but that's all.

My biggest regret is that this film has virtually no action to recommend it – I can't remember our hero fist-fighting a single villain! He kills a few off but it's all very stately and routine. One of the biggest sells is that he dresses up in a cool skeleton outfit to commit his robberies, but even these admittedly fun scenes are few and far between (although the house climb is a highlight). Glenn Saxson is the Hungarian hero, and he's very Aryan and good-looking, but he's also without charisma and it doesn't help that his character is pretty vicious, unpleasant and self-motivated. Helga Line – who I ADORED in HORROR EXPRESS – plays a dual role and is fairly attractive in an icy way, while Ivano Staccioli is a suitably greasy villain-type. Best of all is Andrea Bosic, playing the Scotland Yard inspector hot on Kriminal's heels, who has an absolute ball in his comic relief supporting performance.

The action shifts from London to Istanbul, with time for sightseeing on the way, but it's all very dated and routine. The film feels overlong and the ending is a damp squib – some nice train stunts but that's it. More action, less po-faced seriousness and KRIMINAL might have been good; as it is, the Turkish rip-off films featuring skeletal hero Kilink had the right idea purely because they were sillier. Umberto Lenzi is a fantastic cult director and he puts in good work here, but this is middling stuff. A sequel, THE MARK OF KRIMINAL, followed in 1968.

Generic Italian super-criminal movie

[gridoon2024 · 5/10 · 24 January 2012]

One of several Italian "costumed super-criminal" outings made in the mid-1960s (for a brief period, I think it was the third most popular film genre, after spy movies and spaghetti Westerns), "Kriminal" has good production values but a rather bland look - there is nothing distinctive about it, except maybe the title character's skeleton costume, which he wears very briefly. Kriminal may be good with his fists, a master of disguise, and a clever criminal planner, but he doesn't have much charisma or personality, except maybe for an obnoxious arrogance. The women are pretty but dreadfully underused. The film gets dull more often than it should. ** out of 4.

"I'm sure he's a lot closer than we think"

[hwg1957-102-265704 · 5/10 · 6 September 2021]

Another Italian master criminal film which was on the whole not that captivating. You can't get invested in an unlikeable lead character, particularly when played by the wooden Glenn Saxson, caught up in a confusing storyline about diamonds. Most of the supporting characters are forgettable. There is not much to recommend in the film apart from pleasant location shooting in London and Istanbul and Helga Line in a double role.

Lenzi comic book movie

[BandSAboutMovies · 5/10 · 23 April 2020]

Roel Bos, using the stage name Glenn Saxson, appeared in this movie and its sequel, as well as a few spaghetti westerns in his career before becoming a producer.

This is based on the fumetti neri Kriminal, which has a hero of sorts that has no issue murdering people and then sleeping with women before killing them to keep his identity a secret. Director Umberto Lenzi wanted to make a comic film, with the goals of making Satanik or Danger: Diabolik, but ended up making this.

Kriminal is much less ruthless in this film, which is more a fun spy film. Andrea Bosic (the optician from Fulci's Manhattan Baby) is Inspector Milton, who follows our antihero around. Horror actress - and spy film too - par excellence Helga Line shows up too. I've mentioned her in so many Eurospy reviews, but you can also find her in Horror Express, Nightmare Castle and The Vampires Night Orgy.

The best part of this movie are the animated open and close titles, which lend a really interesting look.