The Milieu Trilogy: The Italian Connection (1972) 4K Restoration
Director: Fernando Di Leo Run Time: 95 min. Rating: R Release Year: 1972 Language: Italian
Starring: Adolfo Celi, Henry Silva, Luciana Paluzzi, Mario Adorf, Woody Strode
Country: Italy, West Germany
Language: Italian
The Milieu Trilogy consists of three classic crime films by Di Leo—Caliber 9 (1972), The Italian Connection (1972), and The Boss (1973). These can be easily viewed as stand alone films, or all together. See these restorations on screen at the Film Center this November!
About the film:
When a shipment of heroin disappears between Italy and New York, a small-time pimp in Milan is framed for the theft. Two professional hitmen are dispatched from New York to find him, but the real thieves want to get rid of him before the New York killers get to him to eliminate any chance of them finding out he’s the wrong man.
“I am a huge fan of Italian gangster movies… And Fernando Di Leo is, without a doubt, the master of this genre.”
—Quentin Tarantino
About the filmmaker:
Fernando Di Leo was a prolific filmmaker who explored the political extremism and mafia corruption in Italy during the 1970’s. Master of garish, intricately plotted, ultra-violent stories about pimps and petty gangsters, Di Leo has perfected the genre with an uncanny accuracy. Di Leo’s films demonstrate the degradation of the working classes and how the mafia corrupted them. Though he slipped out of public consciousness after his death in 2003, his works have been revived and shown at the Tate Modern in London and The Venice Film Festival where Quentin Tarantino admitted that Di Leo truly inspired him to make gangster films.
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