Na Trilha da Morte

When a mobster is assassinated in Naples by the gangsters of Gennaro Gallo (Giancarlo Sbragia), the retired hit-man Peter Marciani (Yul Brynner) learns that Gallo was the responsible for the murder of his brother. He travels from New York to Italy to revenge his brother and he hires the smalltime crook Angelo (Massimo Ranieri) to work for him. Angelo introduces Peter to the dancer Anny (Barbara Bouchet) and they have a love affair. Meanwhile the Italian police inspector (Martin Balsam) unsuccessfully tries to anticipate Peter's move.

"Con la rabbia agli occhi", a.k.a. "Death Rage", is a deceptive thriller with Yul Brynner. The unoriginal story uses clichés most of the time with a poor development of characters. The shameful Brazilian DVD released by the Cult Classic distributor has worn out image and is awfully dubbed in English. My vote is four.

Title (Brazil): "Na Trilha da Morte" ("On the Trail of the Death")

I found Death Rage to be a fun little Euro-crime movie that's much better than it's reputation would suggest (or at least better than many of the reviews I've read). Yul Brynner plays Peter Marciani, an aging hit-man hired to go to Italy to kill a mob boss. At first he refuses until he learns that his intended target is responsible for his brother's death. Along the way, he meets and befriends a young, overly helpful, wannabe mobster and a beautiful showgirl. Can these three pull off the job?

Quite simply, Yul Brynner is the man! He brings a certain authenticity and coolness to Marciani and makes most of the film a blast. I bought into his hit-man persona completely. When confronted by two hoods wanting to take him to see their boss, Marciani calmly says "If I were you, I'd shoot." One of the hoods tells Marciani that he's worth more alive. Marciani's response - "If I were you I'd still shoot". How classic is that! Death Rage also features a number of exciting car chases and gun battles in the narrow street of Naples. These scenes are exciting and very well done.

The film co-stars Barbara Bouchet. For the most part, she is underutilized and most of the scenes involving her are too predictable. You just know that at some point the bad guys are going to use her to get to Marciani. Also, I never really believed the relationship between Marciani and Bouchet's character. The two made a ridiculous looking couple.

Finally, I can't really end this without mentioning the subplot involving a problem with Marciani's eyes that, I suppose, relate to the film's title in some way. These scenes are pointless and go nowhere. Can you say "padding"?

While I've rated Death Rage a 6/10, I'm almost positive that my rating would change if I ever have the opportunity to see an uncut copy of the film. My copy of Death Rage has a runtime more than 15 minutes less than that listed on IMDb.

Yul Brynner's last film before giving up cinema for the stage, and it's a Naples based crime film directed by Antonio Margheretti. I wonder if that's what put him off.

In New York, Yul is informed by a local mob boss that the guy who killed his brother is now located in Naples, where an American mobster has just been gunned down by the same guy. Yul heads off there for revenge, and recruits a small time crooks called Angelo (who really wants to be in the big leagues) as his eyes and ears. Angelo also introduces Yul to stripper Barbara Bouchet, who immediately falls in love with the fifty-six year old guy who looks like a peanut.

Yul's character also has a reputation of being a hard-ass contract killer, and his running about in broad daylight wasting mobsters draws the attention of cop Martin Balsam, who intends to either use him to destroy the local mob, or at least get Yul killed so he gets some sort of result. I wasn't quite sure to be honest.

Yul also has this strange affliction where, under stress, his vision goes all red and he flashes back to his brother being killed. It's never really explained but I guess it does have something to do with the plot so we'll just let it slide for now.

The main storyline focuses more on Yul's relationship with Bouchet, and his mentoring of Angelo as a contract killer. Will Barbara change Yul's mind about being a cold-blooded killer, or will Yul's cold blooded killing put Angelo off a life of crime? You'll have to sit through a lot of cold-blooded killing to find out!

The De Angelis brother supply a very funky but melancholy soundtrack that adds to the general bitter atmosphere that'll stick with you. For years this was one of the easier Eurocrime films to find as it was in the public domain. I've now watched the complete version and if you track down the shortened free version you don't miss out on much anyway. Good stuff.

One of Yul Brynner's least known films and the last film he made. Death Rage has Brynner as Peter Marciani, retired hit man that is force out of retirement to avenge the death of his murdered brother. Marciani (Brynner) goes to Naples and after the man he learn killed his brother, mafia kingpin Gennaro Gallo.

The film is fine generally speaking: not great but it is not horrible but it is the storyline that that seems to be lacking something to me and I'm not sure what - maybe a little bit more action scenes and a little less talking at times? My point being: the film needed some "spice" that it lacked to make this film stand out better. Really the only thing to make this film stand out is Yul Brynner himself - and that's it.

If you like 1970s crime-action films you might like this one but just remember this film could use a wee bit more action... also if you are a fan of Yul Brynner's then I would recommend the film to you.

5/10

Another selection from the 200 Drive in cult classics from those fine people over at Mill Creek.

Basic euro revenge mafia movie. Yul Brynner's last film. He play a hitman retired from the business but brought back in to kill the man who killed his brother. Decent enough movie nothing really stands out but very watchable. Worth a watch just for Mr. Brynner alone.