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Hands Over the City

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Tomatometer 4 Reviews 87% Popcornmeter 250+ Ratings
An entrepreneur secures land for a construction project through political complicity.

Critics Reviews

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Fernando F. Croce Slant Magazine 10/14/2006
3/4
For the most part, however, the film remains rigorous in its refusal to draw tidy conclusions. Go to Full Review
Yasser Medina Cinefilia 06/03/2022
7/10
Rosi builds it with a rather sober staging that never loses the dramatic depth or the sense of polysemic realism to interrogate bureaucratic corruption in the municipal sphere of post-war Italian society, [Full review in Spanish] Go to Full Review
Dennis Schwartz Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews 04/12/2011
A-
One of cinema's most complex looks at how democracy is corrupted by a system that doesn't work. Go to Full Review
Jake Euker Filmcritic.com 11/07/2006
3.5/5
a bracingly muckraking piece of filmmaking Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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03/24/2018 There's so much to love here: the bombastic performance of Steiger, the film's bitterly cynical view of business, and for just being a plain savage movie which kind of just tells us like it is. See more 06/29/2013 Recensioni arretrate 3: Capolavoro da mostrare nelle scuole. Drammaticamente triste che 50 anni dopo il film sia di un'attualità mostruosa. See more 02/24/2013 I have now seen two Rosi films and have this to say about both of them: despite their portrayals of events that might now seem dated, these films retain an immediacy, an urgency to acknowledge the power games that are played in all governments, past and present. Hands Over the City is a powerful film that urges us to be cognizant by filming shady dealings in opulent rooms, the black and white cinematography acting like a stark x-ray of the ugly interior of political surreptitiousness. Rod Steiger is the outlier of the film as he was a noted Hollywood actor acting in an otherwise documentary-style film, but his involvement in no way detracts from the overall message. On the contrary, Steiger gives a poignantly restrained performance where all of his character's thoughts are reflected on the claylike malleability of his face. He stands as the ominous monolith to deception and unadulterated avarice that the film so nobly and thoroughly attacks. Rosi is an important filmmaker. See more 04/07/2011 Francesco Rosi made some of Italy's best political realist films of the 60's, and this one, about a ruthless land developer using his political position to further his business, and avoid criminal charges, is especially wordy and penetrating. The black and white photography is stunning. See more 01/23/2011 Por fin una brillante película de crítica social que no tiene desenlace feliz ni martirio final. Esta película debería ser obligatoria para todos los estudiantes de leyes, aspirantes a políticos o simplemente para quienes desean ser educados en como se manejan los asuntos de estado en nuestro tiempo y en todo lugar. See more walter m @Harlequin68 10/13/2010 "Hands over the City" is a compelling look at municipal corruption in Naples that states that while this is an imagined story, the circumstances are very real. The movie starts with a building collapse that claims two lives.(And I am left wondering how they got that shot in the first place.) In the city council chambers, De Vita(Carlo Fermariello), the leader of the left, calls for an investigation into the accident but is blocked. So, he takes a different tack by investigating the procedures for approving building permits. What they find is not pretty. All roads lead to Edoardo Nottola(Rod Steiger), an ambitious property developer, and crooked as they come. But he is not alone. The others are just better at hiding. For example, one official mentions an approval took three days when it usually takes six to twelve months. His colleague marvels at the efficiency. But the point of democracy is to slow things down enough so that nobody does anything hasty and will regret. Democracy is also about serving the public which the center-right coalition in the film seeks to subvert by taking power for the sake of it and of course the money to be made. At least, the left has the people's interests at heart. See more Read all reviews
Hands Over the City

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Movie Info

Synopsis An entrepreneur secures land for a construction project through political complicity.
Director
Francesco Rosi
Producer
Lionello Santi
Screenwriter
Raffaele La Capria, Enzo Forcella, Enzo Provenzale, Francesco Rosi
Production Co
Galatea Film
Genre
Drama
Original Language
Italian
Release Date (DVD)
Oct 24, 2006
Runtime
1h 45m