#101 - Danger: Diabolik

Oh baby, this is choice. What we have here is another link to the Beastie Boys. The Beasties used clips from an old super spy looking movie in their Body Movin video, and if you couldn't guess, this is that movie. It turns out that the guy is the best thief in the entire world and spends the movie evading the law or sexing up his hot lady friend. Usually, one leads to the other cause nothing is a better aphrodisiac than high dollar smuggling followed by a narrow escape from the law. One of the things that made this movie interesting was seeing what the Beasties took from this movie and put into their video outside of the obvious use of film clips. There is a surprising amount of stuff, and it's used in some interesting ways. If you haven't seen the video, they show it on this disc along with a little interview with the director of the video, Nathanial Hornblower, a.k.a. Adam Youch, a.k.a. MCA.

Aside from the Beastie Boys connection, there is a TON of stuff here that amuses the living hell out of me. This is another case of seeing the source material for a seemingly endless amount of spoofs. And the style of this movie is so over the top in every aspect that it is quite easy to do a spoof of. Everything is way over the top. The heists, the escapes, Diabolik's underground lair. By the way, the guys name is Diabolik. What's interesting about the film's style is that if you take any of the individual elements of the film(plot, acting, scenery, cinematography), they are ridiculous. None of it is believable and could easily be considered cheesy. But the makers of this film went to the extreme in all aspects. How many times have you watched a movie where the film makers were too scared to commit to the ridiculousness of what they are making, and therefore ending up making the movie worse than what it would have been if they just had some cojones? These guys went there with everything. Sure, there is overacting around every corner, but does it matter that much in a movie where the government takes all of their gold and melts it into one huge brick as a lure to catch the master thief? AND HE STEALS IT TOO!! Look, it may not be your thing, but it is certainly amusing, and consistent from beginning to end.

And now for the serious analysis. There is a point in this movie where the government puts a bounty on Diabolik's head. He decides that no one can cash that in if there is no money. So he blows up all of the country's financial institutions, thereby destroying all financial records of any kind. First of all, that's ridiculous. Second of all, that would NEVER be allowed to be filmed in this day and age. This is not a condemnation of the current atmosphere that is sensitive to all things deemed "terrorist", it's just something that put things into a bit of a perspective for me. This feeling was supported by some of the things in the bonus features. The bonus features brought up some things that I hadn't thought of, but are related to what was on my mind. Mainly, what the mindset of Italians was in the late 60's. Think about it, the main character of this movie is a villain, and not in an anti-hero way. He is a criminal, the police are trying to catch him, and we are rooting for him to get away. He makes them look like fools at times, and we enjoy every bit of it. It's an interesting reversal of what we are used to seeing and puts more things into perspective for me. Of course, there's also some sweet lovemaking with his hot ass lady friend on the piles of cash that they had just stolen and taken to his underground lair.