Film

Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in New York, plus articles, trailers and more

 

Lucky Luciano (1973)

Director: Francesco Rosi

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

Rosi's characteristic dossier on power and corruption tracks the enigmatic figure of repatriated Mafioso gangster Luciano through the web of political/criminal complicity that set the course of Italy's post-war 'recovery'. While specific judgment on Luciano himself is open-endedly reserved, the evidence adduced from a variety of sources (mosaic-style, with Siragusa, for instance, playing himself as a US Narcotics Bureau investigator) is damningly clear on the way the Americans established the Mafia as a 'friendly' buffer against communist influence, only to later have the worm turn vengefully with a flood of drugs back to the States. Film noir meets the conspiracy thriller in a flurry of masterful set pieces, operatic intensity segues into documentary-like observation of the complex machinery of manipulable power, and Rosi provides a context for the Godfather films which threatens to outdo their own cinematic forcefulness.

Author: PT

Time Out Film Guide


  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields





Features

Bridesmaid revisited

Bridesmaid revisited

Anne Hathaway crashes more than a wedding in Rachel Getting Married.

Old-school house

Old-school house

Even in the age of the multiplex, a few old movie theaters continue to thrive in NYC.

Keeping the faith

Hope abounds in Spike Lee’s latest—as it does in the director himself.

Going the distance

TONY toughs out the Toronto International Film Festival, blow by blow.

Race you to the top

Tyler Perry doesn’t need critics—and may not need new audiences.

Spanish intuition

Scarlett Johansson and Rebecca Hall flirt away an Iberian summer in Vicky Cristina Barcelona.

To air is human

Man on Wire, a new doc about a surreal Manhattan morning, aims high.