PimpinAinttEasy This is a film I watched only because I am a big fan of Gian Maria Volante. I'm not aware of the political context of this film.The film came across as a one sided political satire that is severely critical of a right wing newspaper and its almost godlike ability to manufacture popular opinion. The film is also a sort of a murder mystery with a brief account of a love triangle.The murder of a teenage girl provides an opportunity for a right-wing newspaper to blame the crime on a communist activist, just before an important election. The film provides a detailed account of how the editor of the newspaper (played by Volante)and his colleagues goes about manipulating the public opinion against the communists.Laura Betti was very good as a jealous lover. The scene where she reads out of her rival's (the teenage girl) diary is quite hilarious. Volante's performance seemed to be uninspired. His role as the evil conniving editor of the right wing newspaper where he simply walks into witnesses, reporters and suspects houses and convinces them to support the case against the communists was hard to digest. The scene where he manipulates Betti's character was rubbish.The editing was flawed because scenes seemed to end rather abruptly. Background score was quite good but was used minimally.There were some nice directorial flourishes like the ending with a dry canal being filled with polluted waste filled water.

JasparLamarCrabb Marco Bellocchio's indictment of the press as an opinion-making machine that turns the public into sheep is a bit in-your-face, but it's also a well thought out and well put together thriller. In Milan, when a young girl is found murdered, a highly regarded newspaper blames a trouble-making radical and whips the public and the police into a frenzy. The paper's editor-in-chief (Gian Maria Volonté) assigns idealistic cub reporter Fabio Garriba to cover the story. Garriba soon realizes that he too is being manipulated by Volonté. It's a brutal and frank movie that makes it clear that the established press is the enemy, fabricating stories, printing half truths and innuendo over facts. Volonté, well-known for his left-wing leanings in real life, is great in a role that has him representing the establishment as both impeccable and oily at the same time. He dons three piece suits, dines with the bourgeois and comes across as a pillar of respectability when in fact he is a lying bastard. Laura Betti gives a brilliant performance as a pathetic would-be radical cut down to size by Volonté. The music is by Nicola Piovani and Ennio Morricone.

MARIO GAUCI Considering the sheer amount of (vaguely boring) movies flaunting their individual creator's extreme left-wing politics to emerge from Europe throughout the 1960s and 1970s, it is hard in hindsight to believe just how many talented film-makers were 'duped' into upholding such naïve ideals; that said, the other side of the coin – basically equating Fascism – was even less comforting and that more dangerous…but it does make for rather intriguing (and ultimately more rewarding) cinema! Bellocchio's film, then, was one of a handful of titles to look at this alternative 'option': perhaps the most famous such example was Elio Petri's Oscar-winning INVESTIGATION OF A CITIZEN ABOVE SUSPICION (1970), which shares with the picture under review its leading man – Gian Maria Volonte'; like that one and Dino Risi's similarly excellent IN NOME DEL POPOLO ITALIANO (1971), the film takes the form of a thriller – both this and the latter, in fact, involve the investigation into the rape and murder of a teenager emanating from high society: here, a radical is accused of the crime – and hounded by Volonte''s opportunistic newspaper for it – but the guilty party turns out to be somebody else, ferreted by a reporter not taken in by his superior's wiles, who is pursued in turn (and even blackmailed!) by the unscrupulous editor. The movie paints a most cynical image of the press, beginning with Volonte' 'embellishing' – and directing his underlings to shoot – a fire that broke out at the office during a riot (he is seen making intermittent contact throughout with the politically-affiliated young owner of the paper, played by "Euro-Cult" stalwart John Steiner); later on, while viewing the TV broadcast of a talk-show he was involved in, the man even takes it upon his wife – for her passivity and intellectual limitations!; however, the worst victim of his dishonesty is the uncouth schoolteacher (Laura Betti) he befriended in order to exploit for her affair with the murder suspect – one of the film's best sequences is the one where she is made to confront her lover's fellow activists in the police station. The film features a good Morricone-esquire score by Nicola Piovani and ends on a shot depicting the rampant pollution at the city limits – a metaphor for the so-called "yellow press" and remarkably similar to the finale of yet another newspaper movie, the classic FIVE STAR FINAL (1931).

Mozjoukine After a punchy start, the political banners of a coming election across Milanese streets and a leftist demonstration that leads to fire bombing the news paper office where editor Volonte is quick to take advantage of the story, this one weaves through what looks like it will be a complicated account of class warfare but ends up being a simple minded polemic. It's hard to swallow an editor personally intimidating the guilty party into silence for his own purposes.However this is the Volonte of L'ATTENTAT and INDAGINE SU UN CITTADINO, dominating the screen with a stops out performance and just watching him is worth the ticket price. Laura Betti, as the party faithful he makes look as if she has betrayed her cause, can go head to head with him. No one else stands much of a chance.There is a great Morricone sounding score and expert camera-work - zooming down passage ways to provide menace. The use of a working newspaper as background is particularly effective.These European political thrillers, of which Volonte was the mast head star, are a rewarding collection and should have wider circulation.