Quick MILANO ROVENTE thoughts, Umberto Lenzi & Antonio Sabato

I was able to take in MILANO ROVENTE (aka GANG WAR IN MILAN) last night. I haven't seen Dagored's CRIMES OF THE BLACK CAT, but am aware of the lackluster transfer. The MILANO ROVENTE disc actually looks pretty good. If you are expecting something along the lines of Alan Young Pictures or Media Blasters, then prepare to be disappointed. It isn't that nice. The image is letterboxed at roughly 1.85:1. I'm not sure if that is the correct ratio (Lenzi tended to shoot most stuff 2.35:1 then) but it doesn't look like much is missing. The colors are nice and there is minimal print damage. It is a decent transfer that suffers in darker scenes. Still, I found it very easy to watch. The only problem may be the subtitles which are extrodinarily small in some instances. The extras include a photo gallery and trailers. The trailers are in awful shape and I hope their upcoming transfers don't look that bad.

As for the film itself, it is worth at least one view. The storyline is the Italians vs. the French. More accurately, the Italian pimps vs. the French drug pushers. Antonio Sabato stars as Salvatore Cangemi, Milan's biggest pimp who refuses to get in the drug trade with some French gangsters. Ah, a pimp with standards. Of course, this is what makes MILANO difficult. How can one root for a guy who repeatedly degrades/beats women and smacks around people because "the English language annoys him" at a bar? The film is interesting to watch in that it is Umberto Lenzi's first crime/mafia film. Up until this point, Lenzi had done westerns, gladiator films, spy films and a couple of giallo but nothing this focused on Italy's crime element (unless you count KRIMINAL). This comes off as a blue print for his later works. I wonder if Lenzi gauged what audiences liked the most and least from this film and infused them into his next entries. It is a theory that may hold some water because just a year later he would deliver ALMOST HUMAN, his Italian crime classic.

This is only the second Antonio Sabato film I have seen. He is fine here, but I like the other film of his (THE LAST DESPERATE HOURS, where he plays a mafia boss who gets infected with a deadly plague!) better. It is scary how much his son looks like him.

I had exactly the same feelings when I watched Milano Rovente. Lenzi was definately 'testing the water' when he made this film. I think this was his first poliziotto (?) It's a good film and anyone familiar with Lenzi's later ventures into this genre (Almost Human, The Cynic the Rat & the Fist, Rome Armed to the Teeth) should definately check it out.