Popular reviews

• 

  Review by Sean Baker 6

  Part of the Lina Wertmüller mini retrospective on Mubi US.

  Giancarlo Giannini won best actor at Cannes for this wonderful performance. But Mariangela Melato is just as much of a show stealer.

  Available on Kino Lorber Blu-ray as well.

• 

  Review by truman ★★★★½

  i needed something this great after sitting through 5 evil bong movies.

  like a feminist version of fellini. fantastic.

  and giancarlo giannini’s eyes... oh my this man can act

• 

  Review by Rembrandt Q Pumpernickel ★★★★★

  Love and Anarchy may have the most muted color scheme of any film I've ever truly loved. It almost feels like it was planned to be shot in black and white, which would give the film more visual pop. But pop would be the wrong choice to elevate this film's plot and themes. It's a film about a culture in tatters. Its aesthetic drabness mirrors the glorious ruins that are scattered throughout the film and surround the main action. The filmmakers create an impression of Italy as a culture past its prime. There's a grayish tone to most of the scenes that somewhat recalls the color scheme of a corpse. I'm at a loss exactly how to describe how something…

• 

  Review by Will Steele ★★★★

  Before her historic Oscar nomination Lina Wertmüller made her mark as one of Italy’s most renowned auteurs. Whilst Seven Beauties is her most significant work, Love and Anarchy provides a messier but nonetheless fantastic farce. We follow a coy and melancholy country boy - played by Giancarlo Giannini - on his torrid trail to assassinating Benito Mussolini. 

  Coincidentally or subliminally, this film echos Fellini’s Amacord which also released in 1973. Between the Italian’s adoration of eggs and living under the shadow of violent intolerant fascism, the pair would certainly make for a lively double-bill. The madcap energy of Love and Anarchy won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but today, it was just the flavour of madness I wanted. This anarchic tale of an ambitious anarchist feels like quintessential Wertmüller.

• 

  Review by Sally Jane Black 2

  Speaking of sex... This is a fittingly coarse, strident film. Highly recommended for anyone who hates oppression, loves anarchy, or approves of sexual misadventures with a bit of depth.

• 

  Review by ScreeningNotes ★★★★★

  The farcical tragedy of an amateur anarchist in love.

  Both Tunin's greatest strength and his fatal flaw are loving too much: his romantic entanglement with Tripolina thwarts his plan to kill Mussolini, but it's also how he gets into this whole mess to begin with. Pautasso was his best friend, and perhaps their relationship wasn't romantic or sexual in the way that his relationship with Tripolina was, but when he finds Pautasso dead he's moved to take up his cause. Love is both his creation and his destruction.

  The film frames Tunin as politically curious from an early age: one of the very first shots is of the comically over-freckled baby boy asking his mother what an anarchist is, and…

• 

  Review by Wood ★★★★★ 4

  Jesus Christo this was good. I didn't know what to expect because it was just a random pick, but I didn't expect a sharp dark comedy.

  This dude Tunin sees his friend who was planning to assassinate Mussolin get murdered by fascist police. He then gets roped into becoming the trigger man. This wide eye country wild man ends up in Rome at a Brothel to get the help of some anarchist hookers. He ends up falling in love with one of these STRONG WOMEN and complications in the assassination arise.

  Giancarlo Giannini is so good as the lead playing a conflicted naive assassin but you really can't beat Mariangela Melato's screen presence, she rules. Completely shocked I loved this but pleasantly surprised.

• 

  Review by Joe ★★★★½

  This feels really attuned to the true nature of fascism, not Darth Vader but an unending chain of stupid, greedy pigs, here represented more or less by one guy but standing in handily for the whole trough. Takes a really dark, haunting turn that I think will stick with me for a long time.

• 

  Review by vern ★★★ 1

  ok i know taxi driver came out only 2 years after this and am willing to accept the loner lead, political assassination plotting, and hooker with a heart of gold as coincidence...but that gundraw mirror scene? marty i’m gonna need you to hand in your gun and your badge

• 

  Review by Cristian Torres ★★★

  Part of the 2020 Challenge: 120 Movies directed by Women

  Movie Nº49: Love and Anarchy

  I really wanted to love this film. I still like it and I believe Giancarlo Giannini does an incredible job. Lina Wertmüller feels like a female response to Fellini, and I say that as a compliment. There are a lot of fantastic and beautiful scenes, but the movie meanders too much to be engaged.

• 

  Review by Zoë 🐝 ★★★½

  A weird one. Also my first Lina Wertmüller. I know she is known for some very controversial, thought provoking and out there movies so I think this was a nice and succinct introduction, especially since it didn't get particularly disturbing until the last twenty minutes. I liked the Errico Malatesta quote that finished out the film, about how while these singular assassination attempts hurt the anti fascist and socialist-anarchist cause in the present, these everyday people pushed to the brink by oppression should still be seen as heroes and martyrs of the cause after fascism has actually fallen. That is how I was feeling throughout a lot of Love and Anarchy (Tunin is right but the plan is foolish), and…

• 

  Review by edaz ★★★★½

  Lina Wertmüller warns us, in another visceral film, do not let the theatrics of fascism fool you. The portrayal of Mussolini's help Spatoletti is almost whimsical. He's an asshole bumbling around Rome on a bike, with idiotic goggles like some dumb cartoon character. It's funny. Until it isn't.

  Whether it's love, anarchy, activism, or violence Wertmüller's subversive film is calling for its characters to overcome oppression. Literally. The film ends with a text by Errico Malatesta, an Italian anarchist.

  But it's not all doom and gloom. The potency of these political works by Wertmüller resonate because they are so entertaining, so blasphemous, and take time to reveal their ultimate themes.

  "What does your girlfriend do?"
  "Commerce."

  She is a director…