Il pentito

Serious-minded (i.e. not low-brow) yet obscure Mafia movie inspired by real events; I happened upon its Italian DVD at one of my local rental outlets. As expected, it's highlighted by extensive (and reasonably well-staged) shoot-outs 'interrupted' by (not exactly gripping) police detection and (all-too-familiar) domestic scenes.

The film does have has the benefit of a good cast – led by Franco Nero as the Magistrate standing in for the real-life Giovanni Falcone (he had tackled a similar role in Damiano Damiani's CONFESSIONS OF A POLICE CAPTAIN [1971]: here he's generally restrained apart from a dream sequence in which he's ambushed by gangsters) and Tony Musante as "Il Pentito" of the original title (an option suggested to him by Nero in order to put a stop to the ongoing gang war between two gangland factions: old-style/honorable and new/vicious).

The latter are typified by Erik Estrada who, at one point, is even sprung from jail but, at the end, is allowed to go free. Max von Sydow is both miscast and underused as the New York-based banker whose financial debacle blows the cover on the whole underworld operation, while the sensual Rita Rusic, future wife of tycoon Vittorio Cecchi Gori, plays his and Musante's contemporaneous lover. Ex-Bond Girl Claudine Auger is also briefly on hand as Musante's Sicilian wife, Marino Mase' appears as Nero's carabiniere sidekick, whereas Venantino Venantini turns up as one of the Mafia family heads.

The concluding moments are fairly interesting: Nero realizes that Musante had merely used him to get lawful revenge on his opponents – with a nice final shot which has a series of doors closing in front of our hero, symbolically depicting him shut inside a prison of his own making!

A good film directed by Squitieri. In my opinion it is one of the best in the context of Italian crime films. In particular it has a good screenplay and less violence and action than the previous films. It is played by important Italian and American actors like Tony Musante (who is well known in Italy for his role in "l'uccello dalle piume di cristallo"), Franco Nero, a famous international actor and a certain number of supporting role actors like Ivo Garrani in the role of old "mafioso", Luigi Montini, Venantino Venantini who play the members of "family" and not very known actors like O. Dell'Acqua, A. Freeman, B. DiLuia, T. Palladino actually employed as stuntman in the 70s Italian crime films. This film is one of the few in which police and "carabinieri" collaborate.

It sounds strange but it was shot in English, then as always dubbed in Italian. Lots of actors dubbed themselves and I am convinced that it is more realistic, because the film's characters haven't that typical false Sicilian accent. If you keep attention to all the Italian 70s and 80s films when the plot consist of "mafia", they have that silly false pronounce. Will there be the copy in direct sound since all the actors played in English?

First and foremost I have to say that Squittieri could have used the real names of all the characters he intended to portray, starting with Judge Giovanni Falcone (Instead of Judge Falco), the "pentito" Tommaso Buscetta (Instead of Vanni Ragusa), "pidduista" Michele Sindona (Instead of Spinola), Chief of Palermo's Police Squara Mobile division Boris Giuliano (Instead of the Judge who gets blown away in the bar).

A rather uncanny resemblance to real life characters (Mafiosos and politicians) whose past and present roles in the affairs of Cosa Nostra are still being analyzed by judges and high ranking investigators. Photography was rather good and, useless to say, Morricone's sounds are the right complement to this portrait of Sicilian magistrates' lives.

Franco Nero needs to tone himself down a bit when playing such roles (Judge Falco). This motion picture is a must see. I also recommend Pizza Connection after this one.