Damiano Damiani isn’t probably as well known outside Italy as many other Italian genre filmmakers of the ‘60s and ‘70s, but he was quite successful in his home country, particularly in the ‘60s, and became known for his highly politicized genre pictures like the well-regarded spaghetti western A Bullet for the General and the mafia thriller The Day of the Owl. He would often utilize the genre in order to include subversive elements commenting on the Italian political violence and corruption of the time period. Oddly enough, besides Bullet for the General, Damiani is perhaps most well-known in the western world for his helming of Amityville II: The Possession which bore little resemblance to most of his other work. While the average filmgoer may not be familiar with him, Damiani has a unique voice and interesting filmography that is well-worth exploring.
How to Kill A Judge (1975)
a.k.a. Perché si uccide un magistrato
This densely plotted crime thriller that closes out Damiani’s loosely themed mafia trilogy (with Day of the Owl and Confessions of the Police Captain) stars the great Franco Nero as a director who has made a film about a corrupt judge who is killed by gangsters. When an actual judge attempts to seize the film for perhaps ringing a little too true, the judge is murdered which sparks a whole string of deaths related to the film. Can Nero find out the truth before he ends up dead as well? With an interesting storyline and Franco Nero driving it forward, How to Kill a Judge has a lot going for it. At times it does drag a little but overall is quite well done. Recommended for fans of Italian crime flicks.
La moglie più bella (1970)
a.k.a. The Most Beautiful Wife
With its setting in the world of the mafia, The Most Beautiful Wife at first seems like it will play out like other Italian crime films that Damiani has done. But he ultimately takes the film in a very different direction, making more of a character drama about a strong-willed teenage girl who initially falls for the son of a mafia boss but refuses to give in to his demands to be a subservient housewife. So he kidnaps and rapes her with her parents’ knowledge in an attempt to get her to cave and marry him. She not only continues to refuse him but takes his transgressions to the authorities to bring charges against him. Damiani isn’t the most flashy of directors but that works to his advantage in this case as the unobtrusive camerawork allows us to focus on the strength of character portrayed very well by 14-year-old actress Ornella Mutti in her first role. While the obstacles set against Mutti grow increasingly frustrating to watch, the film has an ultimately satisfying conclusion that makes this a feminist film worth a watch.
Una ragazza piuttosto complicata (1969)
a.k.a. A Rather Complicated Girl
Here we have yet another Damiani film that subverts expectations. Based on the plot description and its inclusion in the first volume of the Troy Howarth So Deadly So Perverse book about gialli, I had a certain idea of how this would play out going in as perhaps a film about some psychosexual mind games and murder. Instead we get a freewheeling very-loosely structured film about a man who listens in on a woman’s lurid phone call with another woman and strikes up a sex-fueled relationship with her. For the first two-thirds of the film, it plays out almost as a series of vignettes involving the couple as they cavort with one another, and screwing with other people as their whims lead them. In the last third it brings the other lover back into the picture but remains enigmatic in terms of where it’s going. The denouement is as random as the rest of the film. As a time capsule of Italy in the ‘60s, it’s interesting but as a cohesive narrative, it leaves one wanting.