REVOLVER

A key work of Italy’s turbulent 1970s crime cinema, Sergio Sollima’s REVOLVER transforms a kidnapping thriller into a tense study of power, corruption, and moral compromise. Oliver Reed stars as Vito Cipriani, a prison warden whose orderly life is shattered when his wife is abducted by criminals demanding the release of a jailed underworld figure, Milo Ruiz (Fabio Testi). Forced into an uneasy alliance with the very man he has been ordered to free, Cipriani finds himself drawn into a desperate flight across Italy, pursued by both the police and a shadowy network of political and criminal interests. Can an obsessed lawman and an escaped convict survive the forces of corruption as well as each other, or does the ultimate law of society belong to the REVOLVER?

Anchored by the combustible pairing of Reed and Testi, REVOLVER blends hard-edged action with the paranoia and social unrest that defined Italy’s Years of Lead. Sollima’s film remains a gripping and emotionally charged example of the poliziottesco at its most intelligent and humane.

THE MORRICONE CONTRIBUTION:
Driven by the famous theme "Un Amico," the score alternates between melancholic lyricism and nervous, urban tension. It never settles into a stable emotional state, blending the emotional directness of a pop ballad with the fatalistically propulsive feeling of being trapped inside a machine.