March 28, 2017 Elio Petri: Todo Modo Elio Petri’s tendency towards obfuscation stepped up yet another gear with Todo modo (76), which is one of the strangest films ever made. Set in the near future, it delineates an Italian society that is run by a coalition between powerful industries, the ‘party’ and – above all – the Catholic Church.
May 20, 2016 Elio Petri: Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion For 1969’s Investigation of a Citizen above Suspicion, Elio Petri turned his eye to the then nascent urban crime thriller, a genre that reflected – and some would say preyed upon – the political and economic uncertainties rife in Metropolitan Italy at the time.
March 13, 2016 Elio Petri: We Still Kill the Old Way After all the high-concept exuberance of The Tenth Victim, We Still Kill the Old Way saw Petri move from sci-fi to the crime genre and, stylistically, marked a return to a more subtle, low-key approach.
March 14, 2014 Slap the Monster on the Front Page Slap the Monster on the Front Page is a political thriller from Marco Bellochio starring Gian Maria Volonte
December 8, 2012 Slap the Monster on Page One – Review A short review of Marco Bellochio’s 1972 film, aka Sbatti il mostro in prima pagina, starring Gian Maria Volonte and John Steiner
April 19, 2012 Face to Face, Monthly Film Bulletin Review A personality switch between a bandit leader and a dying university professor might have made an interesting variation on more familiar Italian Western themes…
