Well Deserved Praise

Strictly average movie

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

If you want to watch Gian Maria, the greatest actor of all time, at his best, watch him in "Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion", "Le Cercle Rouge", "For a Few Dollars More" or "I Am Afraid", he worked much much better with Petri, Melville, Leone and Damiani. This one is very boring and Volontè doesn't appear much. And when he appears, he has the same face that does not say too much. This role did not quite fit him. Rosi's films, most of them, are a special genre, very close to the documentary, very hard to follow, you got to have a patience of steel...

This is the real story behind Lucky Luciano , born Salvatore Lucania November 24, 1897 – January 26, 1962, the high priest of crime , the detailed account the world's most powerful mobster who built an empire on a sea of blood . This international co-production by Italy/US/France deals with the deported crime boss who is sent back to Italy . This picture is plenty of mayhem , strong stuff , drama and amount of gangland violence . Biographic movie about the notorious kingpin Lucky Luciano , though depiction is about the final years , including various flashbacks . Lucky is one of the bosses of the Mafia and leader of Cosa Nostra or Mafia, and soon became a chief in the Reina Family during the height of the Castellammarese War. Then takes place a Mafian War between Salvatore Maranzano, who eventually defeated the faction headed by rival Joseph Masseria . After Masseria's murder , this position was short-lived, as Maranzano himself was murdered in 1931 . Then , the family is headed by Charles "Lucky" Luciano , eventually known as the Genovese Family. He orders the slaughter of 40 other responsible , a famous massacre nicknamed Sicilian Vespers , therefore becoming the only boss. But a few years later he is put into jail. This landmark mobster movie is strong stuff , being dominated by the tenacious acting of Gian Maria Volonte as the gangster of the title who follows his way venomously since his US expulsion through criminal career in Naples and Sicily . As trivia , previous Federal Narcotics Agent Charles Siragusa , Lucky's real-life nemesis , plays himself . There appears several known gangsters as Vito Genovese well played by Charles Cioffi and the informer named Giannini rightly performed by Rod Steiger . Director Francesco Rosi's body-strewn look at the feud between gangsters , Commissioners and Judges, , but especially concerns about Lucky Luciano given a good interpretation by Volonte . This is a violence-ridden story full of action, drama, thriller , suspense but being overlong . The notorious gangster Lucky Luciano is splendidly played by Gian Maria Volonte who makes a good character study of one of the most colorful mobsters of the history . Glimmer and evocative cinematography by Pasqualino De Santis , though being necessary a correct remastering . Adequate and atmospheric musical score by Piro Piccioni . The motion picture is well based on true events : Lucky Luciano was an Italian-born, naturalized American mobster born in Sicily. Luciano is considered the father of modern organized crime in the United States for splitting New York City into five different Mafia crime families and the establishment of the first Commission. He was the first official boss of the modern Genovese crime family. He was, along with his associate Meyer Lansky, instrumental in the development of the National Crime Syndicate in the United States. On January 3, 1946, as a presumed reward for his alleged wartime cooperation, now Governor Thomas E. Dewey reluctantly commuted Luciano's pandering sentence on condition that he does not resist deportation to Italy. As two federal immigration agents transported Luciano from Sing Sing prison to Ellis Island in New York Harbor for deportation proceedings . In Italy and Sicily begins becoming one of the chief of the Mafia. The US Army seems to refrain from interfering his business . But in 1946, Luciano secretly moved to Havana, Luciano's objective in going to Cuba was to be closer to the United States so that he could resume control over American Cosa Nostra operations and eventually return to the United States. Meyer Lansky was already established as a major investor in Cuban gambling and hotel projects . In October 1963, Valachi had testified before Subcommittee on Investigations of the U.S. Senate Committee on Government Operations that the Mafia did exist . Although Valachi's disclosures never led directly to the prosecution of many Mafia leaders, he was able to provide many details of its history, operations and rituals, as well as naming many members and the major crime families , Luciano among them . With the death of Maranzano, Luciano became the dominant organized crime boss in the United States. He had reached the pinnacle of America's underworld, directing criminal rules, policies and activities along with the other family bosses. Luciano also had his own crime family, which controlled lucrative criminal rackets in New York City such as illegal gambling, bookmaking, loan-sharking, drug trafficking and extortion. Luciano became very influential in labor and union activities and controlled the Manhattan Waterfront, garbage hauling, construction, Garment Center businesses and trucking.

This movie is boring. Plain boring, nothing else. And I've a great tolerance of movies that most people find boring.I still wonder what I just watched. Is it a documentary? Most gangster films are pretty slow, but this one is more than that. All action happens in 15 minutes, then...nothing. It's like there was no editor, or that the material was shot for some kind of documentary.Gian Maria Volontè plays his role very good. Rod Steiger is nice, but doesn't get enough time to be as great as he usually is. The rest of the cast is OK, not a problem here. Gangsters look like gangsters, cops look like cops and the dames are plenty.For some seven years now I have been collecting gangster films, read books about the subject and even collected news articles about the mafia and such. Most of what I saw in this film is not new for me. Luciano was famous and is nothing short of legend these days. When he moved out of the US, he kind of got into the darkness. When this film dragged on, I saw some potential stories come by, but all just passed and went on. So nothing happened until the end where that thing happened that everyone that ever read a book about the mafia knows that happened.The soundtrack doesn't help. Piero Piccioni can't even live up to his usual 'clone morricone' music and seems only to have written about 7 minutes of music.The DVD I got was a UK version without any subtitle. I can watch English spoken films without much trouble, but half of this is in Italian, so beware! At first I feared this would have been a action movie disguised as a gangster film, but even that wasn't true. It is slow and all that. Of course, I never thought I was going to watch a true classic, but I almost felt asleep. Still, I cannot give it less than a 4. Gian Maria Volontè and Rod Steiger together in a film, and the sets were good enough. The production itself felt okay. So maybe they should have fired the writer and maybe the editor.It could have been so much more!

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.