SmugKitZine Tied for the best movie I have ever seen

Arianna Moses Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Ortiz Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Allissa .Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Leofwine_draca A pumping soundtrack. An appealing cast. A profanity-strewn script. A pace that never lets up. Oodles of hard-knuckle thrills and incredibly sadistic action. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, what we have in our hands is MANHUNT IN MILAN, another top-notch Italian crime thriller which plays like a pasta version of CHARLEY VARRICK, albeit without the classy acting and intelligent script, but at least it's a lot more exciting. MANHUNT IN MILAN is proof of the fact that the Italians are in their element when staging elaborate high-speed car chases through beautiful sun-bleached city locations or fast shoot-outs where, if you blink, you'll no doubt miss a death or two. This is a great viewing experience that easily rivals the work of Umberto Lenzi and Maurizio Merli in their later great collaborations in the genre.This sleazy film takes time in introducing the leading anti-hero character of Luca Canali, a good-natured pimp who nevertheless likes to hang out at dodgy clubs and surround himself with naked Italian women. Canali is played to perfection by Mario Adorf as a greasy, loud-fashioned yet kind and initially gentle man who is pushed to the edge as he finds himself pursued across his home city by a series of increasingly violent hit men, who work for big-name gangster Don Vito, played by one-time Bond villain and genre regular Adolfo Celi who excels at this kind of thing and pulls the part off perfectly. The stakes are raised when Adorf's ex-wife and child are brutally murdered by the Mafia and he arms himself to take revenge, taking out Don Vito's entire family in the process and eliminating tons of goons in exciting shoot-outs.The various thrills are handled spectacularly by director Fernando Di Leo (an action specialist who also gave the world CALIBRE 9 - also with Adorf). The pacing is slow to start off with but gradually builds up into breakneck speed, culminating in a huge city-wide chase sequence at around the hour mark which is truly amazing stuff. Stuntmen risk their lives, vehicles are totalled in milliseconds, and you'll be swept away by the rhythmic music that perfectly accompanies the action and makes the whole thing madly exciting. Definitely one of the best chases I've seen in the movie and, trust me, I've seen a lot. The finale, in which Adorf faces off against the two hit men in a junkyard, is highly suspenseful and ends with a fine imaginative payoff for the villains.When it comes to the violence, Di Leo doesn't hold back, with women being savagely beaten, point-blank gunshots to the head, and all manner of beatings and stabbings along the way. The main reason the film works, however, is that it never loses touch with characterisation, instead fleshing out Silva and Strode from being one-dimensional villains into understandable, even somewhat likable real people. Along with Adorf and Celi, Silva and Strode (great-sounding pair, that) put in excellent portrayals of ruthless hit men. Silva is fine as the smarmy womanising partner whilst Strode is at his best playing it tough and silent. The supporting cast are also fine with lots of familiar faces in minor parts, these include Luciana Paluzzi as the fragile female lead and Puzzle's Bruno Corazzari playing yet another sleazy low-life. The cast, the pacing and the action combine to make MANHUNT IN MILAN one of the Italian 'polizia' (I guess it falls into this category despite the almost total absence of police in the film) to beat and a highlight of the Italian film industry. See it!

skullislandsurferdotcom Although two New York hit men, Henry Silva and Woody Strode, supposedly templates of Quentin Tarantino's Jules and Vincent PULP FICTION thugs, are far better villains than local Mario Adorf is a antihero, this Italian mobsploitation juggles each character decently enough... and everything narrows down to one thing only: Adorf, as small time pimp Luca Canali, is – if Silva and Strode can help it – a dead man.The endearing traits of imported crime movies are here in droves: the wah-wah peddle guitar vibrates through the bursting horn section orchestrating insert-heavy action scenes, naked ladies, and a pivotal car chase as Canali, with a fierce boar-like countenance, seeks the thug who killed his family.More attention on Silva, a sly womanizing braggart, and Strode, the brooding baseline, would have been nice – they're far too cool to serve as an eventual backdrop to Canali's quest to survive and then seek answers. That is, until the incredible climactic shootout between all three within a junkyard. Tarantino swears by this one, and who's to argue? For More Reviews: www.cultfilmfreaks.com

The_Void I'm a big fan of Italian crime flicks, and I'm an especially big fan of this one as it's one of the best out there! The Italian Connection is a part of a loose trilogy by director Fernando Di Leo, the other two parts being the excellent Milano Calibro 9 and The Boss, which I've not seen yet. As good as Milano Calibro 9 is, this film is better and I'll be very surprised if it's topped by The Boss. Like many Italian cult films, this one has a list of a.k.a. titles as long as my arm. I saw it under the title 'The Italian Connection', but it's alternative title 'Manhunt' is probably the most suitable considering the plot. It's quite a simple tale of crime and revenge. First we are introduced to two American contract killers who are given the task of going to Milan to track down a pimp named Luca Canali who apparently stole a large amount of heroin from the killer's employers. However, it soon transpires that they've been misinformed when the local crime boss also wants to get his hands on Carneli, before it comes to the killer's employer's attention that it was really him that stole the heroin...The main reason why this film works is down to the simple plotting. The plot itself actually has quite a lot of angles, but director Fernando Di Leo keeps the focus on one thing at a time and that ensures that the film is always thrilling and easy to follow. Fernando Di Leo is clearly very good at directing crime flicks, aside from the aforementioned trilogy of which this film is a part; he also has a handful of other crime flicks to his name, including the very good Kidnap Syndicate. This film is set up like a chase movie, we have the contract killer chasing our unlikely hero (the pimp) for the first part of the movie, then he's being chased the local crime boss' men and the story is given a nice twist in the final third. Cult actor Mario Adorf is great as the pimp Luca Canali; he makes an unlikely hero, but an engaging and interesting one. Henry Silva and Woody Strode are effective as the contract killers, while the cast is nicely topped off by Adolfo Ceri as Milan's crime boss. I would say that this is a fun film to watch, but it's also rather brutal; a sequence involving a cat in a scrap yard at the end sums that up. Overall, I wouldn't hesitate to name The Italian Connection as one of my all time favourite Italian crime flicks, and this one therefore comes highly recommended.

HumanoidOfFlesh When a shipment of heroin disappears enroute from Milan to New York a small time pimp named Luca Canali(excellent Mario Adorf)is fingered by the mafia for execution.There is only one problem...he is the wrong man!Unable to prove his innocence he is caught in a life and death struggle with the New York boss' hit men(Henry Silva and Woody Strode)."Hit Men"/"La Mala Ordina" is a typical Italian crime/drama with plenty of violence and sleaze.The acting is pretty good,the action almost never lets up and the ending is very exciting.Highly recommended if you are a fan of Italian cult cinema.