Lucky Luciano

A cubist Godfather, an abstract mobster ballet: the intertwining of men in “high” places is so thorough as to make the distinction between G-men and H-men impossible in Rosi's powerful indictment of the collusion between CIA and Mafia heroin-mongers during and after World War II. As are most of Rosi's films, Lucky Luciano is centered around a real-life protagonist who remains something of a mystery but whose power is manifest-and power (male power, money power, capitalist power) is the film's true subject. Luciano (Gian Maria Volonté) is a character who never develops, in the dramatic sense, but rather materializes in a New York bistro and then slowly disintegrates in exile in Sicily, whence he apparently masterminds the international drug trade. Rosi's confusion of beefy men is heightened by a media-rich, journalistic, and ultimately Marxist layering of information that is exquisite to watch. A highlight is squealer Rod Steiger, whining and dining in red pajamas, living in the cleavage of his buxom lover, and crawling between back-alley garbage cans to nestle and die.

This page may by only partially complete.