Page 101 - Alternative Europe Eurotrash and Exploitation Cinema Since 1945

Merli's pivotal cop role was that of Commissario Berti (some sources spell his name Betti) - a
fist-driven character first introduced in Marino Girolami's Roma violenta 1975). Berti returns in
Umberto Lenzi's Napoli violenta and comes back for a third round in Girolami's Italia a mano armata
(1976). Whenever Berti was in town, he was there to serve justice — not necessarily to serve the law
and, most definitely, not to serve his superiors.10 It is Napoli violenta that really flows with blood - in
fact, the violence on display is stunning. For instance, a thug's head is smashed in with a bowling ball
in extreme close-up; a woman's head is bashed by a moving train; and a crook is impaled under his
chin on a fence while trying to escape from marauding cops. Here, Lenzi's direction is also intended
to beat the viewer into submission with whiplash camera spins, close-ups of relentless spine-smashing
and merciless head-butting. Lenzi's Naples is overrun by a different type of terrorism than the
politically, government-sponsored terrorist violence of Milan Trema.
In Napoli violenta the emphasis is on Mafia-style violence and oppression. Mafioso protection
rackets hold small business owners hostage by demanding cash to keep their businesses running. If
they do not pay, pockets of thugs ride through the cobblestone streets on motorcycles wielding chains
and throwing rocks through plate glass windows. If you really want to 'buck the system', these unholy
rollers will burn your place of business to the ground with you and your family inside. Berti is sent to
Naples from Rome for one reason - to pummel the mob. Says Berti, when he arrives in Naples, 'They
send me where they want because they know I'm hung up on the job.'
As soon as Berti steps off the train, he runs down a car thief, grabs him by the collar, smashes him
in the face then slams the hood of a car down on the thief's head half a dozen times. He then slaps the
ctook's face and kicks him in the groin, dropping him over the car's trunk. For his first day on the job
in Naples, Berti brings the thief to the Nucleo Polizia Criminale station as a 'present' - a specimen
that comes cheap in Naples. From these actions, it becomes obvious that Berti has little regard for the
law - even though this is a sticking point for the chief of police (Guido Alberti), who has resigned
himself to Berti's tactics. 'I know just how you operate to bug your suspects', the police chief says to
Betti, 'I admit your system works. Though I don't admire police brutality. I suppose the results are
your excuse for using them.'
The police chief's statement, which incorporates tension between Berti and his superior, reflects
what was happening in some police sectors in Italy during the mid-1970s. Some elements within Italy
- specifically in cities that were overrun by terrorist or Mafioso groups - responded with sanctioned
and exceptional police brutality and an instrumental approach to extreme right-wing violence. As
Donald Reid has noted:

Italy promulgated a series of laws that bolstered police powers at the expense of individual
rights and gave a special place to informers; increased the time an individual could be held
in preventive detention; and made individuals of the same group liable for the same sentence
despite differences in individuals' actions."

These authoritarian measures are replicated by the Italian cop films of the 1970s. In the case of
Napoli violenta, the police chief's comments reveal that he was covering himself and the force by
showing disgust at Berti's approach while, at the same time, acknowledging Berti's effectiveness by

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