8/10
"Freeze, luvvies! I mean...you filthy slags"
27 September 2018
You can always rely on Enzo Castellari to knock things up a notch, and even though he had me worried (and a little confused) at the pacing of this one, it all leads up to major kick ass ending.

After the film seemingly randomly shifts between Hong Kong, Amsterdam, Colombia and New York, the film finally settles in Rome, as we see Fabio Testi getting busted for carrying drugs into the country. At the same time and in the same place, another guy who's just arrived from Amsterdam is tailed by cop David Hemmings, who gets duped by the dealers as big old Romano Puppo gets away with the goods.

Yep, Hemmings is hot headed, potty-mouthed cop out to take down a huge drug cartel, and he's the only guy who knows that Fabio Testi is an undercover cop. Things get pretty difficult for Testi as he works his way into the dealer's trust via a junky guy with his own sub plot, and nothing ends up going to plan as everything results in a huge chase at the end that uses feet, motorbikes, and finally, planes. I think there's a deep meaning to all this, and that is "If you deal drugs, Fabio Testi will shoot you."

You've got the usual Enzo back up crew here: Massimo Vanni (who does his 'riding a bike downstairs' bit), Joshua Sinclair as a suave dealer, Romano Puppo as another dealer, and even Enzo himself turns up to mug for the camera. Sherry Buchanan turns up as the junky guy's girlfriend, but she really just turns up to be naked for a minute or two.

I found it strange that there's an obvious stunt double doing even the most routine of stunts for Fabio, but then it's Fabio himself doing all that crazy crap with the planes later. I did burst out laughing when a guy pulled a particularly strange face when getting shot in slow motion.

It does seem however that Enzo is kind of making some sort of comment about the hippy life being dead and leading to horrible addiction, because the drug taking here is shown in all its glory and when you see a guy licking spilled heroin from a toilet seat, it doesn't exactly entice you to go take the stuff. Well done Enzo!
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