Jan 15, 2025
Il cittadino si ribella (Street Law, 1974)
"If citizens start taking the law into their own hands, who will distinguish honest people from dishonest ones?"
#Il cittadino si ribella#street law#italian cinema#poliziotteschi#enzo g. castellari#massimo de rita#dino maiuri#franco nero#giancarlo prete#barbara bach#renzo palmer#romano puppo#massimo vanni#nazzareno zamperla#renata zamengo#franco borelli#luigi antonio guerra#mauro vestri#guido de angelis#maurizio de angelis#one of the earliest vigilante thrillers to crawl out under the monstrous shadow of Death Wish's behemoth success#this actually begins brilliantly; the first act follows Nero's middle class everyman as he gets taken hostage in a bank robbery gone wrong#and then studies his sudden and frightening descent into obsession and a mania for revenge. his impotent fury and foolhardy attempts#to track down his captors‚ and the sickly‚ intense performance of the star‚ set up a far more interesting film about the folly of vengeance#(and the fragility of the male ego) than the one this eventually morphs into. as his film progresses‚ Castellari seems to twist himself#round until he's broadly agreeing with (or at the very least‚ empathising with) this wound up‚ embittered would be action hero. it isn't#surprising perhaps that this ends up such a reactionary (and angry) film; this was made smack in the middle of Italy's years of lead‚ and#the sense of contempt for the police and indignation at an apparently lawless society is palpable. it all ends in high spectacle (very#well filmed it must be said) but i preferred the earlier parts of the film that toyed with Nero's directionless anger as a kind of sickness#Castellari perfected this kind of home brew action anarchy a few years later with The Big Racket‚ but this is still a good time
