The last 85 or so minutes of the film are scenes of Bardone adjusting to prison life and not being comfortable in his new role as fink. But, these scenes could have been trimmed to a third their length with little loss of plot and impact. In fact, the emotional impact would have been heightened for nothing occurs in these scenes that reveal anything regarding plot or character. Especially contrasted to the wonderful scenes of Bardone the con from earlier, these scenes go limp. Part of this is because the film expects its audience to know the story of Della Rovere beforehand, thus many of the scenes play off that expectation. But, coming in to the film cold, these scenes are revealed for the isolated and uninteresting moments they are.
It’s as if this film suffered from middle filmitis, when films that are not first in a series rely too heavily upon an audience’s memories of earlier films to inform them of the traits of characters, the chronology of prior events, and a general knowledge of the world the film series is set in, even though it’s not a middle film. These scenes needed to be cut or given greater expository content. Plus, whether one has read the source novel or not, whether one knows the real story or not, the film so blatantly telegraphs its ending of Bardone becoming so ennobled by his imposture that he decides to join the execution of the men he was sent to fink on that one’s teeth almost hurt from the grating. The film ends on Muller accepting the blame for his plan’s failure.
Naturally, the flaw lies all with the screenplay by Montanelli, Sergio Amidei, and Diego Fabbri. Regardless of the book or the reality, that does not excuse the film’s tanking in the second half. It becomes didactic in the worst way, and this is especially disappointing due to the deft portrait painted of Bardone in the first part of the film. The intermix of documentary footage from the war and obvious set pieces actually works quite well, and the film’s scoring, editing, and technical gimmicks (rear screen projections, etc.) are all fine.
The acting by De Sica is excellent, and that by Messemer is even better. One cannot even fill out a full hand’s digits with complex and human portrayals of Nazi officers onscreen, and Messemer’s Muller may be the very best I’ve ever seen — pragmatic, ruthless, yet even remorseful. The rest of the actors were barely passable, with some of the prisoners reduced to utter stereotypes of profession and ethnicity by either the script or the lack of actors’ abilities. That said, the female characters portrayed by Sandra Milo (Olga the prostitute), who gained fame in Federico Fellini’s 8½, and especially the sexy Giovanna Ralli (Valeria), showed dramatic potential with De Sica that was wasted.
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