Film Review: VIOLENT CITY (1970, Sergio Sollima)

Stars: 3.9 of 5.
Running Time: 100 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Charles Bronson, Jill Ireland, Telly Savalas, George Savalas, Michel Constantin, Umberto Orsini. Music by Ennio Morricone. Screenplay co-written by Lina Wertmüller (SWEPT AWAY, SEVEN BEAUTIES).
Tag-line: "The Godfather" Gave You an Offer You Couldn't Refuse. "The Family" Gives You No Alternative." Classic.
Best one-liner: “You shouldn’t tell daddy lies.”

Sergio Sollima’s VIOLENT CITY is a fairly standard Eurocrime flick full of the standard revenge seekers, codes of honor, jealousy, femmes fatale, mob bosses, and absurd dubbing. But there are a few elements- including the squinty, stoic presence of Charles Bronson; the New Orleans locale; the freaky patchwork of flashbacks, hallucinations, and psychedlia; the unnverving, animalistic, avant-garde Ennio Morricone score; and a shocking, stylish, expressionistic, take no prisoners finale- which really push this thing over the edge. It's no REVOLVER, but it's certainly well worth a watch. (In fact, at times it almost seems to be a loose remake of my all-time favorite noir, OUT OF THE PAST?!) But as in many (Italian) films of this type, it's not the big car chases or the big shootouts that win you over-


Though the shootouts and chases are by no means bad– note the use of frightened children.

-instead it's the bizarro subtleties, eclectic performances, and screwy flourishes. So here's 11 reasons why Sollima's VIOLENT CITY is a place worth visiting:

#1. Bronson is not scared of tarantulas. Or at least mind-blowingly outré tarantula puppets (its unsettling movements must be seen to be believed). In a display of raw machismo, he allows the monster spider to slowly walk past his crotch as he ponders the meaning of his life from the confines of a jail cell.


What's even more ridiculous is that this scene is really well done. The Morricone score drones with suspenseful foreboding; Bronson's cell-mates watch in jaw-clenching horror– and the scene ends with a masterfully jarring *WHOMP* of a finale.

#2. Morricone twangs. I don't care if Lee van Cleef is unbuttoning his saddle to reveal an arsenal of guns or Bronson is revealing that his picnic basket is full of weapons- Morricone will provide a booming, thunderous TWANNNG-G-G! to accompany it. His sense of humor is often apparent in his scores, and VIOLENT CITY is no exception- but he'll quickly wipe away that smirk and replace it with a sonorous growl if he has to...

#3. Telly Savalas. As a suave New Orleansonian mob boss, Savalas gets lots of massages and dispenses fatherly advice to Bronson ("You shouldn't tell daddy lies").

In fact, he's always making references to how Bronson is some greenhorn who can't remember the good ole days (“You wouldn’t understand, you’re too young").

Well, for starters, Bronson is a year older than Savalas; but secondly, Bronson looks like a well-grizzled war vet shitkicker who's no stranger to the insides of a coal mine (well...that's because it's all true), whereas Savalas kinda looks like Mr. Potato Head.

I think it's the glasses that really pull it all together.

In all seriousness, though, Savalas is great. He collaborated four times with Bronson, and here, his smooth, skeezy, and hobnobby presence is an excellent foil to Bronson's laconic badass.

#4. George Savalas, Telly's brother. What is this, FORCED TO KILL?

#5. Bronson's disdainful refusal of a girl drink from Savalas- which, in a single moment, perfectly lays out the relationship between the two men.


#6. Lina Wertmüller's work on the screenplay. An interesting choice for co-writer on an action flick, Wertmüller's solo work tackles politics, gender dynamics, and the natural forces which drive men and women alike to act so despicably, again and again. Her influence comes through most clearly in the semi-complex love/hate hate/love relationship between Bronson and Jill Ireland's character.

#7. Sleazy Antonioni. When beautiful Italo-cinematography collides with genre cinema, a sort of seedy, art house aesthetic emerges, which I clearly like quite a bit.



If Bronson were in L'AVVENTURA, it'd probably look a lot like this.


#8. Bronson's lawyer is hitting on him the entire movie. I'm not sure that Bronson was aware of it- in fact, I'm certain he wasn't, but there's an extremely awkward, one-sided homoerotic dynamic at play here.

Umberto Orsini: unrequited love at the tennis court.


Bronson: flattered, but possibly unable to even fathom the concept of same-sex attraction.

#9. Bronson passive-aggressively stomps on Jill Ireland's photos a full 32 years before Asia Argento would aggressive-aggressively stomp on photos of Vincent Gallo in SCARLET DIVA.


#10. Bronson as a sicky.

I'm not sure I can exactly pinpoint it, but there's something extremely clichéd and surreal about this image, which is fantastic. Get the man an ice pack, please.

#11. Not exactly part of the film, but in an interview with Sollima on the Anchor Bay DVD, he is reminiscing about how Jon Voight was originally considered for the Bronson role. Only he doesn't say "Jon Voight"– he says "Angelina Jolie's dad."

Annnnd on that note... nearly four stars.

-Sean Gill

Film Review: REVOLVER (1973, Sergio Sollima)

Stars: 4 of 5.
Running Time: 111 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Oliver Reed, Fabio Testi, Frédéric de Pasquale (THE FRENCH CONNECTION), Peter Berling (THE NAME OF THE ROSE, AGUIRRE THE WRATH OF GOD). Music by Ennio Morricone.
Tag-line: "The last battle between crime and the law in every major city in the world."
Best one-liner: "I'll find you, even if I have to shake the whole fuckin' countryside out like a fuckin' sock!"

I'm a sucker for Eurocrime, and REVOLVER, a French-Italian co-production directed by Sergio Sollima (THE BIG GUNDOWN, VIOLENT CITY, RUN MAN RUN) combines the cool, glossy visuals and fatalism of Melville with the batshit crazy panache of Castellari. Oliver Reed is a prison warden who's coerced (via his kidnapped wife) to release loner inmate Fabio Testi.
There's hippie pop stars, international conspiracies, class warfare, and lots of tight, tight pants.

Reed, one of my all-time favorites, is, unfortunately, dubbed. You'll be missing out his thundering, expressive voice- but enough of the performance is grounded in his husky, raging, walrus-like physicality that you won't feel cheated.

The Italians love reaction shots, and reaction shots love Oliver Reed. The man was made to deliver a stern, simmering stare.


Thugs have got his wife, and he is one angry man. He lets you know- like Paula Abdul, straight up- that he's only a hair's breadth away from slapping the shit out of you at any given moment.

He will yank around a naked fat man by the hair if he has to.


MAN FIGHT!

...

The voice on the trailer tells us that this movie is so brutal that it'll "make Charles Bronson in DEATH WISH look like wishful thinking!" While I wouldn't quite go that far, I will say there's probably more slapping per capita than any comparable film.

"No!"

YAHHHH

There are a lot of great sucker punches, too.

As the released prisoner, Testi is quite the hardass.

His main character trait seems to be his ability to drop a cigarette from a great height and having it land standing on its end.


Not certain how useful that is, but I guess it's impressive, sure. He wears a lot of whacky fur coats and at one point offhandedly bites a snowball like it's an apple.

Improv!

Not exactly like Brando playing with the glove in ON THE WATERFRONT, but hey, at least he's making acting choices. Most of this could make for an unbearable performance, but Testi possesses an innate, loopy likability

Hey-a!

which is the perfect foil to Reed's relentlessly severe countenance. When they become buddies, your living room will likely be graced with a standing ovation.

Fabio: so needy. Oliver: 'I get my gin back after this take, right?'

There's loads of great lines that sound kiiind of like something you might say in English, but they're subtly Italian-ized: "We're like sitting ducks... at a shooting gallery!," "Why you bloody little piece of horseshiiiit!," or "I swear to God unless you start talkin', I'm gonna see the color of your guts!"

"I'll do it! I'll kill myself!"


"Are you Japanese, boy? Let me tell you something. Only the Japanese know how to use a knife on themselves properly. Only the Japanese."

But it's not all fun and games– the Ennio Morricone score is absolutely masterful, darkly suspenseful, and occasionally emotional (rumbling, dissonant pianos; zesty percussion; and frequent, tasteful quoting of "Für Elise"); and the blunt, ruthless finale is as disquieting as it is abrupt. So here- before you start shakin' the fuckin' countryside out like a fuckin' sock– take these four stars.

-Sean Gill