Il giorno della civetta
Directed by:
Damiano DamianiScreenplay:
Ugo PirroCinematography:
Tonino Delli ColliComposer:
Giovanni FuscoCast:
Claudia Cardinale, Franco Nero, Lee J. Cobb, Tano Cimarosa, Nehemiah Persoff, Serge Reggiani, Vincenzo Falanga, Vincenzo Norvese, Ennio Balbo (more)Plots(1)
The Day of the Owl stars Franco Nero as a police chief who, while investigating the death of a construction worker, goes up against corrupt officials and a ruthless mafia boss (Lee J. Cobb). Adapted from the celebrated novel by Leonardo Sciascia, 'The Day of the Owl' was the first book to openly deal with organized crime in Sicily. Director Damiano Damiani followed in the civic-minded cinema of Francesco Rosi and Elio Petri while forging a new path for the action-orientated cinema of the poliziottesco that would follow, creating something uniquely his own. (Radiance Films)
(more)Reviews (1)
Damiano Damiani was simply fantastic at making these detective films with social criticism that delved into the mafia-influenced conditions of Italian society in the 1960s and 70s. This film doesn't exactly win you over in the opening half hour and you get a bit lost in the jumble of names, but it gets better and better as the runtime goes on. It's brilliantly directed (it flows by like water), it's critically apt, and the final scene with the potentates on the balcony somehow aptly concludes that the fight with the mafia is futile and perhaps even lost beforehand. Claudia is as beautiful as ever, Franco Nero is boyishly charismatic even at his young age, and Lee J. Cobb accurately captures the character of Don Mariano, whom everyone fears and holds in awe.... there, in Sicily, with its own laws and social hierarchy.
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