Richard Conte signed out on a relatively high note on this not-too- bad Italian cop film quickly put together as a spiritual sequel to 1973's LA POLIIZIA INCRIMINA LA LEGGE ASSOLVE. The producers couldn't get Franco Nero or Enzo G. Castellari to come back so instead what they did was hire Nero's lookalike Maurizio Merli and Castellari's father Marino Girolami to direct. On top of that, they brought back genre regulars Silvano Tranquilli, Massimo Vanni, etc. as well as Guido and Maurizio De Angelis to score (often relying on music tracks taken right out of LA POLIZIA). This would not be the only Eurocrime movie to do this.
As relatively cheap and rough as this movie feels with plenty of awkward scenes and barely a plot to speak of, this movie is notable for 3 big points:
1) Maurizio Merli. Merli could have just been a cookie-cutter fill- in for Franco Nero but very much makes it his own with a new definition for "physicality". Merli's first act upon entering frame is to clench his jaw and grind his teeth standing over a poor homicide victim. From then on out it's hell to pay as Merli shoots, beats, foot-chases, and car-chases his way through the criminal underground with dogged determination. It's a formula that worked so well that he repeated it about a dozen times in the following 5 years... usually with Attilio Duse as his clueless loyal sidekick.
2) The car chase! While there were a lot of great ones in the genre, the chase in this film I find the most deliciously entertaining. It takes us through the streets, parks, and highways of Rome, gloriously destroying several cars, a flower stand, a random pile of freeway debris, and several innocent bystanders before it ends. The first crash of the chase is a particular delight, spinning in circles with glass and metal flying in all directions.
3) John Steiner. This film also gave the fledgling British character actor a whole new career by casting him in a small but extremely memorable part as a particularly violent and snarky bank-robber. While Steiner had already had a few memorable villain roles, he said that this film changed the game for him like no other, and secured him nonstop work for the following 15 years. He's hilarious, mischievous, and ultimately frightening in the second of the film's two career-defining roles.
Even if you're a casual fan of the genre, I'd recommend you give this film a try. It represented a paradigm-shift unlike any other film in the genre and set the table nicely for Umberto Lenzi's several subsequent contributions.
As relatively cheap and rough as this movie feels with plenty of awkward scenes and barely a plot to speak of, this movie is notable for 3 big points:
1) Maurizio Merli. Merli could have just been a cookie-cutter fill- in for Franco Nero but very much makes it his own with a new definition for "physicality". Merli's first act upon entering frame is to clench his jaw and grind his teeth standing over a poor homicide victim. From then on out it's hell to pay as Merli shoots, beats, foot-chases, and car-chases his way through the criminal underground with dogged determination. It's a formula that worked so well that he repeated it about a dozen times in the following 5 years... usually with Attilio Duse as his clueless loyal sidekick.
2) The car chase! While there were a lot of great ones in the genre, the chase in this film I find the most deliciously entertaining. It takes us through the streets, parks, and highways of Rome, gloriously destroying several cars, a flower stand, a random pile of freeway debris, and several innocent bystanders before it ends. The first crash of the chase is a particular delight, spinning in circles with glass and metal flying in all directions.
3) John Steiner. This film also gave the fledgling British character actor a whole new career by casting him in a small but extremely memorable part as a particularly violent and snarky bank-robber. While Steiner had already had a few memorable villain roles, he said that this film changed the game for him like no other, and secured him nonstop work for the following 15 years. He's hilarious, mischievous, and ultimately frightening in the second of the film's two career-defining roles.
Even if you're a casual fan of the genre, I'd recommend you give this film a try. It represented a paradigm-shift unlike any other film in the genre and set the table nicely for Umberto Lenzi's several subsequent contributions.