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The 10th Victim / La decima vittima (1965)[REPOST]

Posted By: Notsaint
The 10th Victim / La decima vittima (1965)[REPOST]

The 10th Victim / La decima vittima (1965)[REPOST]
DVD5 | VIDEO_TS | NTSC | 16:9 | 720x480 | 5800 kbps | 4.2Gb
Audio: #1 Italian AC3 2.0 @ 192 Kbps, #2 English AC3 2.0 @ 192 Kbps | Subtitles: English
01:32:00 | Italy, France | Sci-Fi, Action, Thriller, Comedy

Some people like violence so much, that they decide to create a club in which human hunts are organized - members being alternately hunters, and prey, until they end up dead.

Director: Elio Petri
Cast: Marcello Mastroianni, Ursula Andress, Elsa Martinelli, Salvo Randone, Massimo Serato, Milo Quesada, Luce Bonifassy, George Wang, Evi Rigano, Walter Williams, Richard Armstrong, Antonio Ciani, Jacques Herlin, Wolfgang Hillinger, Mickey Knox, Anita Sanders

As a wonderful example of 60s pop art filmmaking, Elio Petri has taken many of the decade's most popular culture crazes (the Bond films, Courreges fashions, discotheque jazz, etc.) and used them with great success to give a plausible look to a highly improbable (in 1965!) future world. Petri's digs at Mad Ave advertising and humanity's relentless pursuit of fame and money (no matter the price) are on-target, and his delight in mocking societal idiosyncrasies (the sun worshipers) is priceless. However, at the heart of The Tenth Victim is the old-fashioned battle-of-the-sexes plot (still very popular in the mid-60s), and yet Petri has the upper hand by his spoofing of the romantic-comedy genre and giving us instead a deliciously amusing trifle that is fun to watch for its joking attitude towards everything it depicts, including Marcello and Ursula! To one reviewer who found it outdated, it must be remembered that this film was made 35 years ago and so it naturally has nothing to do with today's standards - and why should it? That's like dismissing Griffith's Intolerance because it's a silent film!
~ jisenhath

IMDb

A campy futuristic tale where people hunt one another for sport. In this film, Victim and Hunter run around Italy trying to score a kill in front of the movie crews they arranged so they could make commercials from the footage.

The 10th Victim / La decima vittima (1965)[REPOST]

The 10th Victim / La decima vittima (1965)[REPOST]



In a not too distant future, in the 21st Century to be exact, the art of murder has become legal provide that the act is justifiable and part of what is known as "The Hunt" or "The Big Game" (depending on the language in which the film is watched). However should the wrong person be killed, the murderer faces 30 years imprisonment. The Game involves both Hunters, and Victims, in which both parties have to endure 10 rounds (hence the title) in order to win the grand prize which is given out by the sponsors of the game. The film starts with an attractive woman being pursued by a besuited Oriental Hunter, whilst the rules of the game are spelt out by Jacques Herlin. Whilst pursuing his victim, the Hunter stumbles upon a sexy show, at the Masoch club in New York, where a masked Caroline Meredith [Andress] is showing off a skimpy costume whilst slapping customers with relish as part of her act. After removing removing her mask, at Caroline’s behest, the tables are turned and Caroline shoots the Oriental dead, with bullets from her bra.

Enter into the scene Marcello, but what he shares in common with Caroline is that both of them are working on their tenth victim, and both keen to claim the large cash prize. Marcello has also dispatched his 9th victim in a suitably bizarre manner – with a pair of exploding boots (!). Marcello is trying to make back his money after having been taken for everything he’s got by his ex-wife. Soon enough, the fact that both have survived thus far comes to the attention of a producer of Italian television [Randone] who decides that this would make superb entertainment and asks the Hunter and Victim if they would be prepared to have their final game broadcast of television. Both agree to this. Marcello and Caroline are approached by advertising companies, wanting to promote each to kill the other as part of their campaign, with their company logo or slogan being used by the victory to signify victory over the other, lending kudos to the product. However, Marcello is unaware of the identity of who his Hunter will be. The two killers then cross and double cross each other, setting up ludicrous traps for each other, one involving a sound stage and the other involving a crocodile, before apparently falling in love with each other, or is that another part of one or the other’s master plan to kill the other?

Leading the cast is Marcello Mastroianni, again playing a character called Marcello, and a popular character actor after his lead roles in highly regarded and award winning neo-realist director, Federico Fellini. Here, a bleached blond Mastroianni (depite being portrayed with dark hair on the DVD artwork) plays the hero of the piece, as the victim who falls in love with his "huntress" Caroline, a leader of a Sun God cult. Sporting a wide variety of sixties threads, including a brassiere top with tips that shoot bullets, Andress exudes a cool teasing flirty sexiness. As well as Andress, Marcello has to contend with Olga, his chic brunette bitch girlfriend/mistress, sporting a slick fashionable Mary Quant bouffant, played by Elsa Martinelli, herself a rising star in her home country of Italy. All three leads here give entertaining, if ever so slightly dry performances. Given the blackly comedic aspect of the movie, and the general mood of the piece, it might have enjoyed a little more camping it up from the three, but none the less, it doesn’t make it any less an enjoyable experience. Yet there is also something lacking in the chemistry between Marcello and Caroline, something which doesn’t quite ring true.

Also there are un-credited appearances by actors such as Jacques Herlin (distinctive by his bubble eyes), dubber Mickey Knox (who also acted as consultant on the English dialogue), and Anita Sanders who would make her mark in erotic cinema a couple of years later in Tinto Brass’ Nerosbianco, before disappearing once again into smaller roles.

The 10th Victim, although set in the future, paints a pop art vision of how the future could be seen, however only as captured in a 1960’s time capsule, hence it may appear to some as ludicrously dated (not surprising as the film is now 40 years old!). Comic books are works of art, and people are born (such as Caroline) without the need of parents at fertilisation centers such as the "Hoboken Fertilization Center". With four writers (and an apparently un-credited contribution from the master of the giallo Ernesto Gastaldi), and the film being supposedly based on the novel The Seventh Victim, by Richard Sheckley, the film holds together surprisingly well. Since it’s conception and release, the film, without doubt, has had a huge influence on numerous projects since it was first made, ranging from various sci-fi big budget movies such as Robocop and The Running Man, through to having moments being parodied in such comedies as Austin Powers. Also unlike so many continental comedies of the time, and the film under review being primarily a send-up, mildly black comedy, the comedy translates well into foreign languages and for foreign markets. Despite the premise of murder running through the entire thread of the movie, it is never painted in a bloodthirsty, gratuitous manner but cleanly and efficiently.

The film has a wonderfully retro-kitsch feel, which should appeal to all admirers of mid to late Sixties Euro-pop art movies. Although it doesn’t quite have the mood of, say Blow-Up or the saturated bright colored pop art visions of Bava’s Diabolik, Losey’s Modesty Blaise or Schivazappa’s The Frightened Woman, comparisons might be drawn with regards to the mood and texture of the piece when compared with Camille 2000. The visual lusciousness of the piece is as pleasing on the eye as is that of its leading lady, Ursula Andress, despite her half baked attempts at acting ability.

Director Elio Petri, with his unusual and outre approach to cinema has never really been given the credit that it truly deserved, although his warped drama Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion did win best the Academy Award® for best Foreign Film upon it’s release in the early Seventies. There was even a season of Petri films which played as part of a film season a few years ago in London’s National Film Theatre, however, his films are grossly under represented on DVD and it would be wonderful to see more of them available. Although The Tenth Victim is intended as a science fiction piece, it is approached at such an unusual angle, it is difficult to define it’s genre exactly. The film is fun entertainment, artistic enough not to be deemed trash by any stretch of the imagination, owing to all of it’s elements, and watching it over, it is interesting for any discerning movie buff to spot the numerous influences it has had on other movies.

Direction here is solid and stylish, with interesting and unusual compositions, coupled with a lively somewhat frenetic approach to certain scenes. However production values sometimes take a slight back seat, and lighting at times slightly awkward or overly harsh, such in some of the exterior shots. The film was also one of Petri’s first and the limitations imposed upon him are shown by the quality of the print (presumably taken from the original elements) here. There is slight grain, but at times the picture quality changes in terms of color, lighting, skin tones, but this is not the fault of the mastering but simply for the quality of film which Petri shot this feature on. The colors aren’t as vibrant as they might be, but again, this is due to the same reasons explained before.

The film itself has been rarely seen outside of film festivals and badly panned and scanned prints which occasionally crop up on late night cable television is given full treatment here, and is presented in it’s original aspect ratio of 1:85:1 and no doubt looking as good as, if not better than the film did, during it’s initial screenings. The film has been presented in two language options, the original Italian dub (with optional English subtitles) and in English language. There are a few changes in tone and various word changes in the two dubs, but the storyline retains most of it’s flavor whichever language the viewer chooses to enjoy the film in. The English dialog, however, is more funny than the Italian counterpart, though how intentional this is – I cannot be sure. My personal choice would be that of the Italian version, which seems to instate an arthouse feel to the film rather than the rather drab "dubbing by numbers" largely uninspired US track. Sound otherwise is average given that it was shot in mono and there are a few moments of hiss and crackle. One of the most enjoyable aspects of the film is it’s crazy jazzy score by Piero Picconi, with a "song" of sorts, called "Spiral Waltz" which is sung by the then popular singer, Mina, who had appeared in some of Lucio Fulci’s earliest movies which were musicals also starring popular sensation Adriano Celentano.


The 10th Victim / La decima vittima (1965)[REPOST]

The 10th Victim / La decima vittima (1965)[REPOST]

The 10th Victim / La decima vittima (1965)[REPOST]