DUE MAGNUM 38 PER UNA CITTA DI CAROGNE

It's very rare that I have my doubts. I feel that it's a good thing to have a hobby, an interest - something that stimulates you mentally and keeps you from the living death of flicking between the channels in the hope of finding something less boring than the last thing you saw. Of standing in night-clubs, pumped full of drugs so that you actually like the shite music being played so loudly you don't have to think any more. Films are my interest. Heck; I love reading, I love music, I love walking in beautiful countryside on a summer's day - but films, especially ones full of sleaze and style, that's what keeps me from doing something stupid like spending time in a… a... (sneer) gymnasium. So, you see, I think my interest in euro-cinema is a good thing. A balm for the mind, so to speak.

However, sometimes I worry that it's just gone a little too far. A bit too close to dressing up in a Star Trek uniform or claiming that Star Wars contains some semiotic / philosophical / mythological truisms rather than being a piece of crappy tosh. And when I find myself watching Dean Stratford movies in their original Italian language - of which I understand not a jot - that's when I begin to question whether I've looked into the abyss and seen Ben Affleck beckoning me from around the remote control.

It's a funny thing, watching movies without having the faintest idea what the characters are actually saying to each other. Especially when, like 2 Magnum 38 (roughly translated with the help of my handy dictionary as, er, the almost poetic '2 Magnum 38 for a City of Bastards') they are chock-full of talking. All you can do is follow the action, occasionally gleaming an (oft inaccurate) clue from the tone in which things are said (it's a no-no to assume that if voices are raised someone is angry - this is Italian, you know), the facial expression or the body movement. I think that what I'm basically trying to say is that, if my synopsis contains some glaring errors or seems slightly methodical, well… sod it.

Horribly be-shirted Franco (Stratford) seems to be a pimp with one whore, who also happens to be his girlfriend. After a hard night's work they go to their home, a place adorned with the vilest wallpaper I have ever witnessed (it even covers the door!) They talk, they shag, he goes to play snooker with some seedy pals. Interspersed with all this frantic (?) activity are a couple of flashbacks that reveal Franco to have been a hotshot paid assassin. Flashbacks, which can be used with such aplomb by a talented filmmaker, seem to be a particularly virulent weapon of the hack director. In the hands of a true incompetent they are basically distinguished by two facts: they have absolutely nothing to do with the rest of the plot; and that they manage to completely interrupt the flow (such as it is) of the narrative.

Anyway, he ends up in a nightclub where a loony bint dances madly on her own and, for some reason, he is shot in the thigh by some hoods in shiny blazers. Someone - I don't know who - is run over. He meets his girlfriend / whore again, they talk some more, they shag some more and the wallpaper changes from scene to scene. He goes to another disco (at which Mike Flowers (of the fabby easy listening version of Oasis's cruddy Wonderwall) is dancing with some equally hip pals) and is shown an illegal betting ring by the bar owner (who looks like a stumpy Pete Postlethwaite). He also meets a blond lass, Gabry (Erna Schurer), whom he talks to briefly and exchanges addresses (I guess he was offering to show her his wallpaper). However, on his way home he is badly beaten by three hoods, who piss on him whilst he is lying unconscious on the floor.

It doesn't take him too long to recover, despite having nightmares in which his attackers take turns holding a torch to their faces and laughing maniacally. After buying a couple of magnums (guns, not champagne) he goes to visit Gabry, interrupting her just as she's about to start snogging the posh brunette lady she's painting. They talk, they shag (the brunette has departed by this stage), they talk some more. Suddenly, there's a jump cut and, for virtually the first time in the film we have a scene which doesn't actually feature the lead actor. Instead, it features Gordon Mitchell sporting a lovely blow-dried coiffure. It takes some time for it to become clear that he's actually one of the hoods who attacked Stratford, despite the fact that in that particular scene he had a moustache, was about a foot smaller and, well, wasn't Gordon Mitchell. Anyway, they kidnap Stratford's girlfriend / whore and murder her. Which makes Dino even more anxious for revenge…

I'm almost loath - given my linguistic problems - to make a critical judgement of this film. My initial impressions are that it lacks the demented appeal of a Fidani effort, but is far more enjoyable than an Al Brescia borefest. There's a thoroughly inept car chase and some entertaining continuity glitches - plus far, far too much talking. Furthermore, nothing really seems to happen for the first hour and revenge, when it finally does come, proves to be rather dull. However, there is a pretty fine Bruno Nicolai score, which probably makes the whole enterprise seem far better than it actually is.

Mario Pinzauti was a director whose work can safely be described as below the bottom of the barrel. He made a couple of low rent Spaghetti Westerns Let's Go and Kill Sartana (Vamos a matar Sartana, 72) and the Mickey Hargitay 'vehicle' Ringo, It's Massacre Time (Giunse Ringo e... fu tempo di massacro, 70) before contributing Black Emanuelle, White Emanuelle (Emanuelle bianca e nera, 76) to the popular erotic series. His only film subsequent to 2 Magnums was the bizarrely titled Clouzot & Co. contro Borsalino & Co. (78). Virtually nothing he made received anything in the way of international distribution, and it's not too hard to see why.

Perhaps the oddest thing about this (apart from how the distinguished Luigi Pistilli wound up in it) is the appearance of Richard Lloyd, aka Rod Flash, one time peplum superstar of such titles as The Seven Tasks of Ali Baba (Le Sette fatiche di Alì Babà, 61), The Invisible Maciste Brothers (Gli Invincibili fratelli Maciste, 64) and virtually nothing else.

Reviewed by Matt Blake