The Designated Victim is a little-known Italian thriller from director Maurizio Lucidi which borrows its premise from Patricia Highsmith’s novel ‘Strangers on a Train.’ Two strangers meet seemingly by chance. After talking to each other they realise they both have people in their lives that are making things difficult for them. One man suggests they can commit the perfect murder if they each killed the other person’s problem.
The Designated Victim Set in Venice
The Designated Victim is yet another movie to take advantage of Venice’s architecture and winding back alleys. Venice has become the haunted city of the silver screen in films like Don’t Look Now (Nicholas Roeg 1973), Who Saw Her Die? ((Aldo Lada 1972) and The Comfort of Strangers (Paul Schrader 1990). Luci captures the city’s eeriness perfectly.
Tomas Milian Stars in The Designated Victim
Advertising executive Stefano (Tomas Milian) is cheating on his wife. There is very little love left in his marriage. There is even less there when she stops him brokering a deal that would earn him $20 million. As she bankrolls the company there is very little he can do. Stefano keeps bumping into a mysterious aristocrat, Matteo (Pierre Clementi), who offers him a proposition. Matteo will kill his wife if Stefano gets rid of his older brother.
Stefano is tempted, but is not a killer. Matteo means everything he says though and carries out his part of the bargain leaving Stefano as the prime suspect for his wife’s murder. Matteo becomes an increasingly malign influence on Stefano’s life as he tries to force Stefano to carry out the killing of his brother.
The plotting is watertight leaving Stefano with no room to manoeuvre. Every move he makes to extricate himself from Matteo’s plan leaves him deeper in trouble. Italian B-movie legend Tomas Milian gives a subtle, nuanced performance while his co-star Pierre Clementi is more flamboyant. At times Clementi is so out there you wonder if his character is even real and not some deranged spectre haunting the streets of Venice.
Shameless Screen Entertainment DVD
Shameless Screen Entertainment deserves credit for putting together this DVD. With their trademark yellow covers mirroring those of the pulp novels from which the Giallo genre takes its name, The Designated Victim is arguably the finest film in their collection. The disk includes a text commentary by film writer Stefan Novak, an ill-thought out trailer which reveals the film’s devastating final image, and a trailer for some of Shameless’s other releases including Strip Nude for your Killer and Oasis of Fear.
Rating 4/5
- The Designated Victim
- Tomas Milian, Pierre Clementi
- Written by Fulvio Gicca, Fabio Carpi, Luigi Malerba
- Directed by Maurizio Luci
- Running time 96 mins
- Year 1971
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