I attended the first screening a couple of months ago and was really blown away by what the director Alessandro Rota (and the entire crew) pulled off.
With a very limited budget, they got every single detail right, from the costumes, cars and music to how the movie is shoot. There is even an incredible car chase that is just stunning. I live in Turin (where the film was shot) and, believe me, nobody - not even in the golden age of polizieschi - has captured all the locations that you see in those 5 minutes. If some of you saw the original Italian Job you get the idea.
The entire cast is great, but I have to stretch out the performance of Ivan Fabio Perna (who also co-wrote the script) as the memorable villain "Lo svizzero". His acting is obviously influenced by the great Tomas Milian and some of his most iconic roles like "Il gobbo" (from Roma a mano armata aka Tough Ones) and Giulio Sacchi (from Milano odia aka Almost Human), but Perna puts so much into it that the character works perfectly on its own.
In the end what you get with Calibro 70 are 42 minutes of pure cinematic gold.
The movie manages to be an intelligent and sincere hommage to the italian crime movies from the 70ies and - at the same time - going one step further.
I don't want to spoil the surprise, you really have to see it with your own eyes, but I'm sure that everyone out there who loves the genre, will scream of joy when the last frame comes up.
Rota proves that it's still possible to shoot a genre movie in Italy (without being that living dead, that is Dario Argento), if you just have the right idea and enough will power to go through with it.
Considering some really interesting projects that are in the making right now, maybe the times are changing and Italy can come out of its long, long sleep. France and Spain did it and look how many genre movies they have put out in the last decade.
In any case, if it happens, you will be the first to know.
How? By reading Twitch, of course.
The Dude abides ...