This is a quite unique and special movie to watch. It has a great premise and visual style to it. which make this movie an overall pleasant watch.
It really sounds weird on paper; An Italian '60's science-fiction production. It all sounds like an odd and unlikely combination but that's why "La decima vittima" also becomes such a special and unique watch.
It's a science-fiction movie but futuristic would perhaps be a better word to describe it. It's set in the near future but the movie isn't featuring any weird gadgets or anything like that really. It's more a movie that is being futuristic with its visual look, so purely its sets and costumes as well as with its story of course.
The movie is still foremost a satire on modern entertainment and once you understand that, this movie will be an even better and easier one to start appreciating. The concept of the movie is that people in the near future hunt and kill each other for pleasure, in a sort of a game, in which both the victim and hunter get notified about their participation. With all of the themes this movie is handling, it seemed like this movie was at least 20 years ahead of time. It could had been made just as easily in the '80's but also in this modern day and age it would had still been a relevant movie to have been made and released.
It remains still kind of an odd movie to watch, due to its uncommon approach of storytelling and the fact that the movie is often taken a more artistic approach. It therefore isn't always an easy movie to watch, though as a whole the movie still remains a perfectly accessible one.
I only wished the entire movie would had been as good and interesting as its first couple of minutes. I still feel that the movie now instead has some missed opportunities in it and definitely the middle of the movie is being kind of stretched out, slow and not all that interesting.
Visually the movie really doesn't disappoint though. It's using lots of bright color, great looking sets and costumes, all typical for '60's movies and some nicely directed sequences, that are all set up very well and with an obvious eye for detail. Elio Petri did a good directing job with this movie.
It's visually also pleasing to see Ursula Andress in this. It's also a real big role for her and it's good to see she isn't just playing a bit part for a change and also isn't just purely cast as a sex symbol. She adds a lot to this movie and perhaps even mostly carries it.
An unique- and overall pretty good watch.
7/10
Watch trailer
No comments: