Page 96 - Alternative Europe Eurotrash and Exploitation Cinema Since 1945

the American movies as a springboard with the directors diving into their own violent culture to flesh
out brutal but no less heroic tales of subversive crime fighters.
GOVERNMENT-SPONSORED TERRORISM
Even a surface look at the churning Italian political scene during the late 1960s and into the early
1980s brings about a deeper understanding of these films, which were steeped in brutality, sex,
drugs and other Western trappings. The majority of these films were produced with a blatant anti-
government agenda. Italian crime/cop films not only stood against the police force but they blazed
away at the government as a whole, which is always represented as crumbling into despair and fully
corrupt. The best films of the cycle (Milan Trema - la polizia vuole giustizia (1973), Revolver (1973),
Napoli Violenta, Una Magnum Special per Tony Saitta) portray a weakened police force liberally
accepting a bloody terrorist feign and fascist syndicates spearheaded by government officials.
Italy was battling to become a more capitalist (thetefore, more democratic) society, trying, in part,
to embrace Western values. But, as the struggle became more intense, there was an overwhelming
movement of repression toward the country's citizens. There was a repression by employers lording
over workers in the factories and repression by the police (which also represented repression by the
government) toward society in general mixed with a contradictory liberal 'let it be' view of crime and
criminals. It was not long before government resistance by Italy's citizens began to take hold. The most
infamous (and violent) resistance group being the Communist-based faction 'The Red Brigade'.
In actuality, many of these resistant groups were terrorists taking advantage of the wave of
anti-government resistance, demonstrated by ordinary citizens. Terrorist rampages were replete
with bombings at demonstrations and public meetings as well as the bombing of trains and railway
stations. The police, meanwhile, were rendered helpless and, many times, rolled over for these violent
terrorist groups that may have been, ironically, headed up by government officials - hence the idiom
'violent professionals'.
Italian-produced crime/cop films gave oppressed citizens an opportunity to see on the screen what
newspapers at that time did not dare show — that corruption was rampant and the police accepted it
as part of the system. However, even if the police system was under the thumb of politicians and/or
terrorists, there was bound to be a maverick cop on the force willing to provide citizens with two
things sorely missing: law and order. And, ironically, law and order depended on the rogue's use of
extreme violence to get the job done.

VIOLENT PROFESSIONALS - TERRORISTS, C O P S OR BOTH?

On its surface, Sergio Martino's film Milan Trema - la polizia vuole giustizia (1973, aka The Violent
Professionals) can be seen as a cop-bent-on-vengeance flick because, on its simplest terms, it is. Ftench
actor Luc Merenda plays police Commander Giorgio Caneparo in much the same way Eastwood
played Harry Callahan - a man of few words, with action speaking louder than bombs. And Milan
Trema is literally bumper-to-bumper with furious car chases a la The French Connection. And like
'Popeye' Doyle, Caneparo is a character waiting to explode. Caneparo himself sums up his volatile

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