Die Viper (1976)

Die Viper: Directed by Umberto Lenzi. With Maurizio Merli, Arthur Kennedy, Giampiero Albertini, Ivan Rassimov. A tough, rule-bending cop pursues a maniacal, trigger-happy hunchback, a one-handed bank robber and their cronies in an effort to bring Rome’s most powerful crime lord to justice.

“For the most part, this is one of the better poliziotteschi Iu0026#39;ve watched with several of the virtues associated with the genre – unrelenting action, pounding score, hard-boiled dialogue, an undercurrent of sleaze – and two of its top stars in Maurizio Merli and Tomas Milian.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eA measure of the filmu0026#39;s popularity is the fact that the characters played by both leads here (Inspector Tanzi in Merliu0026#39;s case and Vincenzo Moretto, dubbed u0026quot;The Hunchbacku0026quot;, in Milianu0026#39;s) were developed into individual series: in fact, the latter appeared in two more outings, while Tanzi had only one more film to go – THE CYNIC, THE RAT AND THE FIST (1977) which, interestingly, still had Milian co-star as an odious criminal but in a totally different characterization. One other typical feature of the genre is the presence of a veteran American star – in this case, Arthur Kennedy as Merliu0026#39;s by-the-book superior (but whou0026#39;s eventually converted to our herou0026#39;s iconoclastic viewpoint). The supporting cast, then, features any number of familiar faces who thrived in Italian genre movies – chief among them Ivan Rassimov and Luciano Pigozzi.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe film has no real plot to speak of – other than to place Tanzi, at times in rather contrived fashion, in the midst of some action set-up (chasing and/or beating up petty criminals or intimidating some rich-kid suspect) – and, hence, may feel somewhat disjointed. The narrative, however, takes care to include as many social plagues as possible – underage delinquents involved in snatch-and-grab cases, a gang-rape, a drug-overdose victim, a hold-up from a post office (which our hero manages to disrupt virtually single-handed), etc. Besides, while the requisite romantic subplot does come in, itu0026#39;s an unusually complicated one – as Tanziu0026#39;s girlfriend happens to be a magistrate whom he believes to be too lenient, and the couple eventually decide to go their separate ways. That said, I feel that the climactic showdown between Merli and Milian comes up a bit short in comparison with the action sequences throughout the rest of the film.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eStill, the film is quite often hilarious: my favorite moment is when Merli blows his top in front of an elderly colleague – but whose meek interjection eventually leads Tanzi to crack the case! For genre addicts, however, the absolute cult scene in the film is the one in which Milian is made to swallow a bullet by the incensed Merli – but whose tough exterior isnu0026#39;t quite broken in the way the latter had expected, as The Hunchback proceeds to give out a loud hearty burp in defiance! u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eIn the end, I ought to say that Iu0026#39;ll be getting to another of Milianu0026#39;s poliziotteschi – EMERGENCY SQUAD (1974), where heu0026#39;s actually the cop hero – soon. Also, if my Unwatched DVD backlog hadnu0026#39;t taken a serious beating of late (I havenu0026#39;t gone through much but DVD-Rs and rentals for some time!), I would have been inclined to schedule a second viewing of the film (also directed by Lenzi) which contains perhaps his most important role in the genre, i.e. ALMOST HUMAN (1974) – via the u0026quot;Special Editionu0026quot; Italian DVD, which comes with an accompanying Audio Commentary (not included on the R1 u0026quot;No Shameu0026quot; release) and a second feature (Sergio Martinou0026#39;s VIOLENT PROFESSIONALS [1973]) to boot!!”