The film that launched Maurizio Merli's tough police inspector into the limelight is a thrill-a-minute story of cobs and robbers done in the inimitable Italian style. Sure, the plot is light and episodic, but who cares when your film contains action as cool as it is here? Even to genre fans, Merli's crime films all look and feel the same, but VIOLENT ROME being the first seems even more polished and professional than most. Director Marino Girolami invests the film with plenty of style, cool exciting music, some of the finest genre actors around, and places hard-edged action at the centre of the film.
Never has a movie lived up to its title so well, as this film contains some of the most brutal violence you will ever see. Innocent bystanders are bloodily gunned down by criminals, men slug it out with killer blows and sharp slaps to the faces which look like they really hurt, ferocious men shoot each other with guns and machine guns in broad daylight and turn each other into Swiss cheese as a result. The film goes really over-the-top as it tries to shock the viewer as much as possible in some moments. "Highlights" include a crippled man in a wheelchair being beaten to within an inch of his life, an innocent lady being stripped and raped, and a thug opening fire on a park full of happy people and mowing them down from a passing car.
Meanwhile, Maurizio Merli - who, after the international success of this movie, found himself typecast in such productions for years to come, always playing exactly the same part (his name would sometimes change but never his character) - goes gunning for the criminals, engaging them in hand-to-hand combat, shoot-outs, and exciting car chases which really show off the excellent Rome location photography. Sometimes he just shoots them in the back to be sure. The strong supporting cast includes veteran Richard Conte as the leader of a vigilante group which Merli joins, Ray Lovelock as an undercover friend of Merli's who gets machine gunned during an exciting bank raid, and John Steiner as a suave English villain who is coincidentally dubbed by the same guy who did Lovelock's voice in THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE.
The photography is crisp and fluid at all moments and the film has superb pacing which never lets up until the bizarre ending, which you have to admit is pretty offbeat (as is the case in a number of Italian productions). Girolami's excellent direction is what makes this movie so good, and although the plot twists and turns and many characters come and go, VIOLENT ROME retains a relative simplicity which makes it so watchable. Fans looking for a traditional game of cops-and-robbers played out in some authentic Italian locations should check out this movie as one of the highlights of the Italian polizia genre.
Never has a movie lived up to its title so well, as this film contains some of the most brutal violence you will ever see. Innocent bystanders are bloodily gunned down by criminals, men slug it out with killer blows and sharp slaps to the faces which look like they really hurt, ferocious men shoot each other with guns and machine guns in broad daylight and turn each other into Swiss cheese as a result. The film goes really over-the-top as it tries to shock the viewer as much as possible in some moments. "Highlights" include a crippled man in a wheelchair being beaten to within an inch of his life, an innocent lady being stripped and raped, and a thug opening fire on a park full of happy people and mowing them down from a passing car.
Meanwhile, Maurizio Merli - who, after the international success of this movie, found himself typecast in such productions for years to come, always playing exactly the same part (his name would sometimes change but never his character) - goes gunning for the criminals, engaging them in hand-to-hand combat, shoot-outs, and exciting car chases which really show off the excellent Rome location photography. Sometimes he just shoots them in the back to be sure. The strong supporting cast includes veteran Richard Conte as the leader of a vigilante group which Merli joins, Ray Lovelock as an undercover friend of Merli's who gets machine gunned during an exciting bank raid, and John Steiner as a suave English villain who is coincidentally dubbed by the same guy who did Lovelock's voice in THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE.
The photography is crisp and fluid at all moments and the film has superb pacing which never lets up until the bizarre ending, which you have to admit is pretty offbeat (as is the case in a number of Italian productions). Girolami's excellent direction is what makes this movie so good, and although the plot twists and turns and many characters come and go, VIOLENT ROME retains a relative simplicity which makes it so watchable. Fans looking for a traditional game of cops-and-robbers played out in some authentic Italian locations should check out this movie as one of the highlights of the Italian polizia genre.