Unlimitedia Sick Product of a Sick System

SunnyHello Nice effects though.

Marva It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

crystallogic Goddamn, I love this movie! No reservations. No "so bad it's good" nonsense. I'd take this over any of today's glut of superhero movies. I admit I don't know anything about the Diabolik comic, and maybe if I did, I would feel differently. yet I can't see how this would disappoint anyone. It's stylish, exuberant, and enticing. It has beauty, penache and a strange, wild joy in its every action. The characters are broad caricatures but somehow delightful in their way. You root for Diabolik, even though he's a selfish lout, and still find time and sympathy in your mind to feel sorry for poor Inspector Gingko, who works so hard to track and stop this menace to society, yet is flummoxed at every turn. Jesus, it's just greatness.I love how Diabolik and his love, Eva, are always "in a moment". The film is the ultimate expression of decadent splendour, and nothing but. Everything about it is intentional. And I just love the story of Bava under-budgeting the film. I'm sorry, but that's how you do it, and this is the kind of film-making that's interesting to me. You can put millions and millions into a film and produce yet another dull blockbuster for the masses, or you can do something for less than a third of the budget offered that's stylistically grand and uniquely individual. I know what works for me. This is lovingly recreated from the mood and atmosphere of a garish comic, with Bava's attention to visual detail, colour, and painterly imagery. It's an episodic masterpiece, where Diabolik thwarts the law and authorities at every turn, and where they slowly catch up to our debonair thief, only to have still ended up several steps behind him in the end. Oh yes, the ending is glorious, make no mistake, and I scoff at a comment below that finds it somehow "inept". The movie ends with a wink! A literal wink at The Man, The Social Order, and the audience. Huge smiles all round. It's punk as hell and it's all very funny, from the bitchy lady's reactions to her jewel disappearing to the shame-faced minister appearing on TV to humbly ask the citizens to please pay the taxes they think they owe after the records have all been blown up, to Diabolik infiltrating the meeting held to discuss his destructive activities and filling the room with laughing gas, so all the idiot politicians just make fools of themselves.The music rocks in a fine swinging, reverberating, truly 1960s pop fashion. I love the singing and the twangy, almost surf-like guitar. There's also some noisy electronics and synth noodling that are a bit ahead of their time. I'd definitely enjoy hanging out at one of Diabolik's swanky clubs and smoking some of his herbs. You should too.

FlashCallahan Thief Diabolik wreaks havoc on a generic European country for his own financial gain and amusement. He shares an extravagant underground lair with his curvaceous, yet shallow girlfriend...who uses her looks and allure, to help Diabolik kill innocent people and steal billions from the government. Because of the origins of his wealth, Diabolik must face off against bumbling cops and revenge-seeking mafia........You done just see this film, you experience it, because its one of the most trippy, psychedelic, and surreal movies you will ever see. Yes, 2001: A Space Odyssey, has that trippy sequence, and all around stoner feel to it, but this is just blatantly in your face bonkers.For starter, we are rooting for a quite despicable person, a murderer, a robber, who in any normal film would be the main villain, but here, you cannot help but like him, because the film almost brainwashes you to do so, as the other characters are so superfluous to the narrative.Law is brilliant as the titular character, and proves that he made some wonderful decisions in the sixties, as this, along with Barbarella, are two of the most iconic movies from that decade. Yes, there are more popular movies, but these two films are referenced so many times, that you may think you've already seen them numerous times before.It out Bonds Connery, and Myers could only wish Austin Powers will be as fresh a this still feels thirty years from now.The soundtrack is wonderful, and although the film makes no sense in the slightest, it's still an amazing piece of cinema....

JohnHowardReid Lavishly produced but extremely low on credibility, this movie featuring a comic-strip super-villain runs for an extraordinary length of time. Its repetitious plot is over-acted by everyone in the cast except John Phillip Law – who plays the frozen-faced, impersonal, uninteresting and uninvolving Diabolik. Marisa Mell makes up for some of Law's deficiencies, but Terry-Thomas grossly over-acts. Fortunately, his role is small. Michel Piccoli is okay as the hero. It's Adolfo Celi who comes out of the movie with flying colors, but unfortunately his role is comparatively brief. Morricone has contributed a disappointing score. As I said right from the start, lots of money was wasted on this one.

Bogmeister MASTER PLAN: steal everything. Based on the Italian fumetti/comic strip, this was director Bava's follow-up to "Dr.Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs" and, at first glance, would seem merely a slight upgrade from that earlier unfortunate campy fiasco. But, with the availability of a decent DVD version, the picture's strengths become more readily apparent. Bava's ability with design and color enables a fairly successful transposition from comic books to movie screens. Many might point to "Dick Tracy"(90) as another such heartfelt attempt to capture comic strip ambiance on the screen, but that one was far more blatant & apparent. Bava's creativity due to a lack of a huge budget resulted in a more subtle interpretation of comic book action, as incongruous as that sounds when talking about an adaptation of a comic strip. Some of the images here, whether large buildings or close-ups, are startling - something seems a little off in the image but you're not sure what it is. When you think about it or view it again, you realize it's a comic book come to life. Bava was also fond of filming a frame within the frame, resulting in some intriguing compositions. This also invites comparisons to "Barbarella," released a little later. But, Barbarella's images are awfully static when compared to all the movement we see here - everything and everyone moves here - whether on foot, in a sports car or on motorcycles.Since this was the sixties, one also can't help but think of the James Bond craze of this period. The obvious difference between this and the Bond imitators is that the central character is a villain, not some agent-hero. Diabolik (Law) specializes in outrageous acts of thievery; at the point the film begins, the establishment (government & police) are well aware of him, to the point that they resort to unusual methods of transporting valuables in an attempt to avoid him; of course, they fail. Diabolik wears a weird comic book-styled suit, with a mask that covers the lower half of his face; yet, you can still see the outline of his mouth. He also has a weird, sinister laugh, though this is not over-indulged. He operates from a fantastic underground hideout, an expansion of the Batcave from the "Batman" TV show. Of course, he does not work with the authorities but against them, a rather subversive message in those pre-Watergate times, where-in the audience is placed in the position of rooting for this, at best, anti-hero; but, remember, this is from Italy (see Sergio Leone's 'Man-With-no-Name' western trilogy). Also, rather than hanging out with a younger version of himself, as Batman did, this guy gets it on with a cool chick; ah, yes, the villains do have all the fun. Keep in mind, though, his violence does extend to killing cops, so it's not just a laughing matter.There's no 'main' plot line; the authorities make a deal with a local bigshot gangster (Celi, the villain from "Thunderball") to capture or eliminate Diabolik, but this plot is wrapped up way before the conclusion. The story switches to an attack by Diabolik on all the economic bastions of power, a rather direct act of terrorism (though there are no realistic repercussions, such as showing fatalities) and then there's some climactic action involving all the gold on a moving train. It's as if the filmmakers took several disparate plots from the comic strip and welded them together in one film; but, it holds together pretty well, against expectations. The ending is a little on the eerie side. Since this is, overall, an amusing and even silly take on the super-hero/super-villain genre, it may be why "Mystery Science Theater 3000" chose it as one of the films they made fun of, an honor they saved for the most silly movies out there. But, this has enough esoteric style and panache to place it above those clunkers and MSTK3 should have saved their efforts for some other truly dumb film. Anti-Hero:6 Villain:6 Femme Fatales:6 Henchmen:5 Fights:5 Stunts/Chases:7 Gadgets:6 Auto:7 Locations:6 Pace:6 overall:6