Milan calibre 9

Milano Calibro 9 is story-wise closer to noir, complete with femme fatale, a laconic and weathered protagonist and unexpected plot- twists but in the same time is plagued by the usual workmanlikeness that plagues many of these Italian police films. Di Leo's direction lacks the unique touch, visual and otherwise, that elevated Melville's films from simple potboilers. So even if the movie attempts to break the mold of typical poliziotos, the direction makes it look like the kind of films it tries to distance itself from. The political aspect is pretty heavy-handed, to the extent that it is almost entirely and explicitly manifested through the dialogues between Luigi Pistilli's "criminals are the effect, not the cause" left-ist inspector and Frank Wolff's typical hard-assed police captain.

On the good side, Gastone Moschin's understated performance as Ugo Piazza is fantastic and thankfully makes up for Adorf's atrocious overacting, Barbara Bouchet is gorgeous as usual and also gets to show her dancing skills in a bikini, the music is cool and the plot twists near the end are effective in their unpredictability. The story is interesting enough I guess but as a whole color me unimpressed.