On a day like today, "Beast with a Gun" was the best thing I possible could have stumbled on! Long and tiring day at work, depressing weather and no energy left at night to do anything else but watch a totally undemanding and adrenalin-rushing action thriller. Next time YOU feel this, watch this bonkers Italian 70's kick-ass movie! "Beast with a Gun" features non-stop raw and gritty violence, misogyny and gratuitous sleaze and an assemblage of the coolest villainous characters ever; led by the ultimate spaghetti bad-boy Helmut Berger. The plot is literally full of holes the size of shotgun bullets, but who cares when the film swiftly leaps from one spectacular action scene to the next? Helmut Berger plays the titular (ferocious) beast with a gun. Or the titular mad dog. He deserves all the bad-ass sounding a.k.a titles, because Berger truly is one of the meanest SOB to ever appear in a 70's exploitation flick. And, given the market supply, that must mean something, no? Nanni Vitali escapes from prison along with three other convicts. Well actually, the other three are too petrified to disobey Vitali's orders and help him eliminate the police informant who testified against him in court. He then literally commands a woman to sleep with him and help with a money heist. When that doesn't go according to plan, Vitali is so mad that he takes hostage police commissioner's Giulio Santini's sister and father. This is just a small listing of the main events in "Beast with a Gun", but there's a lot more going on. Every few moments or so, there's either a virulent beating or nasty gunfight going on, and Helmet Berger seems to get gradually more ill-tempered and rotten with every minute that passes. No wonder Quentin Tarantino referred to him and his character here in this film during "Jackie Brown". The dumbness of the script is quite often too bothering and, in all honesty, bring the overall quality of the movie down a little bit. How is it possible, for example, that an entire army of police officers cannot prevent that two people die during an anticipated heist and that all of the criminals get away with a van full of hostages? There are more senseless elements and defaults (like the fact that lead actress Marisa Mell entirely vanishes during the final act) but, to hell with it, I really don't feel like yammering about this 200% fun and exciting film. Oh and if you like Italian cult cinema, you WILL adore the terrific soundtrack by the relatively unknown (at least, in comparison to Ennio Morricone or Riz Ortolani) composer Umberto Smaila.
Review of Beast with a Gun
