Poliziotti violenti

Admittedly "Poliziotti Violenti" won't ever get listed in any "top 10 greatest Poliziotesschi" rankings (or top 20, for that matter) but nevertheless I'm still awarding it with a generous rating 7/10, simply because it plentifully features all the things that I seek and love about this genre! For starters, the film doesn't star one but two heroic macho protagonists. The stoic-faced Henry Silva and the groovy Antonio Sabato form a surprisingly good duo, especially when they're ravaging the city on borrowed motorcycles or visiting sleazy transvestite clubs! Furthermore is "Poliziotti Violenti" low on complex plot twists and overlong dialogues, but rich on virulent shootouts, ruinous chases and gratuitous violence. Silva stars as a fanatic military major who gets transferred to a desk job after bringing too many sensitive army issues to the surface. One day, he prevents a kidnapping on the street from happening and notices that the hoodlums were using machine guns of which he knows for certain they are only intended for military usage. Since his own supervisors are corrupt as hell, Silva teams up with unorthodox police inspector Sabato in order to find out who's supplying deadly guns to street gangs. "Poliziotti Violenti" contains a few very ingenious scenes, for example how to rob a jewelry store with an ambulance, as well as some perplexing moments like senior citizens beating a purse- snatcher to pulp! In spite of the astounding Silvio Dionisio appearing topless a few times, the number one reason why I'll remember "Poliziotti Violenti" is because of the excessively brutal collateral damage. Italian directors are notorious for butchering random bystanders in their movies, but this one goes quite far. Dozens of innocent people are gunned down in drive-by shootings or even savagely run over by cars. The bad guys even blow up an entire restaurant in an attempt to eliminate our two heroes (but naturally kill everybody in the restaurant except them)