El bandido

This movie has a great beginning and a moving ending,but the gangsters story in the middle is not on the same level.

Ernesto ,a prisoner of war,comes back to his dear Italy ,to find his mother killed in a bombing and his sister a prostitute. The prisoners packed up on a train, the crowds on the platform with the distraught German woman claiming " he married me ", the drive through a ruined country ,the exhausted prisoners coming against an inhuman local government ......All rings true ..

What follows is a bit disappointing ; as the precedent user wrote, the social context is almost completely forgotten ;Lattuada may have had "I'm a fugitive from a chain gang " in mind ,this film noir classic ,but his story is a trite unconvincing story of cops and gangsters and La Magnani is totally wasted as a moll .....

The epilogue,which I will not reveal, is a beautiful touch of melodrama, a genre Amadeo Nazzari knew quite well.