ALMOST HUMAN is a really clever kidnap thriller. I found myself rooting for the cunning, wretched, murderous and lecherous Giulio Sacchi (played by Tomas Milan who is unrecognizable after I saw him play an earnest journalist in DON'T TORTURE A DUCKLING a couple of days ago). He is a character straight out of a Jim Thompson novel.After he botches up a bank heist, Guilio hatches a plan to kidnap a rich heiress and demand 0.5 billion as ransom. He commits a string of murders during the kidnapping and hostage taking.One of the main features of Italian police thrillers is that they pushed the boundaries with regard to what could be put on film. Some of the stuff that the Guilo character pulls off in this film would be frowned upon today.The film has some great writing filled with witty one liners and jokes. Hope it gets a blu ray release.Anita Strindberg as Milan's hapless but devoted girlfriend invoked sympathy. I find it hard to take Henry Silva seriously. He is unintentionally hilarious like in Cry of a Prostitute. (8/10)

ALMOST HUMAN (Umberto Lenzi - Italy 1974.I had missed out far too long on Umberto Lenzi's best known crime flick, which is hands down one of the best poliziotesschi I've seen so far, almost on par with the best of Fernando Di Leo's work, together with Lenzi one of the more prolific directors within the genre. Whilst generally acknowledged to be one of the better Italian crime flicks, Lenzi's somewhat ham-fisted approach to his gialli, had made me a little reluctant to catch up with any of his other work. Although Lenzi's own VIOLENT NAPLES is also a well-made, highly effective genre entry, this one comes close to beating out that one when it comes to sheer brutality and an almost unbelievable barrage of nasty violence.A rarity in most Italian crime thrillers, this film benefits enormously from an intriguing and woefully ambivalent central character, played with tremendous vigour by Tomas Milian, who plays Guillio Sacchi, a violent low life scumbag with no regard for human life at all and with a real penchant for torture and rape. The other side of the law is represented by stone-faced Henry Silva, who switches to playing a cop this time, instead of his usual turn as the calculating crime kingpin. The story by Ernesto Gastaldi is simplicity itself and doesn't take all kinds of distracting side-roads that make many other genre efforts so forgettable in that department. Anyway, if you're still in doubt about the merits of Italo-crime flicks, watch this one. An intriguing story, Tomas Milian in a great role and Ennio Morricone contributes another impressive soundtrack what must be one of his most recognizable scores this side from Sergio Leone. I keep wondering if the members of the Academy, who recently honoured Morricone with the honorary Oscar, had any idea what kind of films the maestro generally got involved in.Camera Obscura --- 9/10

This seems to be a very typical Italian crime film...and boy, do i love it. Ennio Morricone has a short, but killer instrumental tune going on at the very beginning of the film, setting the mood for what this movie is all about. We have the fine Tomas Milian playing a pathetic, gunhappy bastard who gets ticked off very easily and spends most of the movie killing the people he gets near. A high bodycount for mr. Milian here. Great boys...are you happy??? i know i am for owning this movie. I even have the soundtrack in my collection. Go see it boys!!! The American title for this movie "Almost human" is very misconceiving, as Milian in no sense seems like a human being. A translation of the Italian title is more correctly "Hate in Milano-the police can't shoot".

ONCE upon a time in Italy the "poliziottesco" movie. Titles like "Milano odia", "Roma violenta", "Torino nera" ecc. were common and that is significant to understand the 70, with fear of terrorism, austerity after the bachanal of the '60 boom. So, according to the Siegel line, Lenzi creates probably his best movie. Tomas Milian is the ideal actor for that kind of loser, raged agaist the richs but without ideals. Only ferine rage hopelessy. So today this film illustrated well the clime of grey tension of that years. In the days of his issue someone shout that it was a "fascist" movie, only because the cop (Silva) can applies his revenge not as a policeman but as a private citizen...this is a little bit siegelian... The only thing than Lenzi could make better is to realize a more significant characterization for the figure of Henry Silva, wich substantially is marginal in respect of Milian. But we all know that the importance of the movie is based on the shoulder of the loser. All in dark, dirty locations with bad wearing...Once upon a time the '70!!!