loosely focusing on Lucanio's life in Italy, this movie combines elements of documentary, gangster flick and political movie.
a Reality component is added to the movie by Charles Siragusa playing himself as prosecutor of Luciano. In the real world Siragusa failed to prove Luciano's involvement in drug trafficking from sicily into the US. and in this movie he seems to put an effort into using the results of his work to render luciano's role in the business.
in the first half of the movie there is an extended sequence about vito genovese's time in italy something that seems completely disconnected from the rest of the plot, no hints are given about his actual connection to luciano and his role in the Gene Giannini hit shown later in the movie.
things may be very confusing for viewer who doesn't know the biographies of people like luciano, vito genovese, joe pagano, meyer lansky and other mobsters as the movie constantly jumps between different periods of times, places and people without explaining their interconnections.
so that being informed on those characters should be necessary to understand what this movie is about.
for the whole time characters are elaborated very well and portrayed in a humanistic way supported by the brilliant soundtrack composed of a couple of 50ies jazz tunes and absolute top level cinematography.
the performances delivered by Volonte as Lucky Luciano and Rod Steiger as Gene Giannini are on a Level that remains to be seen in other movies.
culminating in the Gene Giannini hit where the atmosphere reaches a level of stunning dramatical density.
a Reality component is added to the movie by Charles Siragusa playing himself as prosecutor of Luciano. In the real world Siragusa failed to prove Luciano's involvement in drug trafficking from sicily into the US. and in this movie he seems to put an effort into using the results of his work to render luciano's role in the business.
in the first half of the movie there is an extended sequence about vito genovese's time in italy something that seems completely disconnected from the rest of the plot, no hints are given about his actual connection to luciano and his role in the Gene Giannini hit shown later in the movie.
things may be very confusing for viewer who doesn't know the biographies of people like luciano, vito genovese, joe pagano, meyer lansky and other mobsters as the movie constantly jumps between different periods of times, places and people without explaining their interconnections.
so that being informed on those characters should be necessary to understand what this movie is about.
for the whole time characters are elaborated very well and portrayed in a humanistic way supported by the brilliant soundtrack composed of a couple of 50ies jazz tunes and absolute top level cinematography.
the performances delivered by Volonte as Lucky Luciano and Rod Steiger as Gene Giannini are on a Level that remains to be seen in other movies.
culminating in the Gene Giannini hit where the atmosphere reaches a level of stunning dramatical density.