Well, there’s absolutely nothing released this week in Italy, so instead I’m going to turn my eye onto Bastardi, a crime film that was came out at the beginning of the year in a select few cinemas. I can’t work out quite what’s going on with this; it doesn’t seem to have been on general release and certainly hasn’t made any impact on the box office, which is bizarre considering the calibre of the cast.
Anyway, it’s apparently a neo-polizioteschi comedy, a kind of homage to the Italo-crime thrillers of the 70s. The story revolves around two rival ‘families’, the Luvara’s and Patene’s, whose low level hostility breaks into outright war when Luca Luvara (Massimiliano Caroletti) is wrongly accused of murdering one’s the Patene’s in a disco. Meanwhile, a precious crown has is in the country, and both families are hatching ingenious plots to steal it.
Sounds fun, and just look at the cast: Franco Nero, Barbara Bouchet, Giancarlo Giannini, Massimo Vanni. And, just like in the old days, there’s an imported, ‘past it’ US TV star…. Don Johnson, of Miami Vice.
Let’s hope this one makes it onto DVD!