This is being reissued by................
Added 4/2/2009
Blue Underground later in 2009. Its should be the same transfer as this Anchor Bay version.
This is a excellent 1960's Italian sci-fi movie. Very well done for the time period. Be sure to keep checking Amazon for the reissue.
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The Future Was Then
Added 12/13/2008
The reason this groovy, 60s, dystopic, thriller/sex farce holds up so well is because it's years ahead of it's time, foreshadowing commercialized violence as sport as well as the advent of reality television. Given it's timeliness, the picture seems due for a remake. (If it were it would probably be dubbed a rip-off of Mr. & Mrs. Smith which it closely resembles. Indeed, the ideas and details here have been picked pretty clean over the years.) This isn't a masterpiece, and some bits miss the target, but it's fast-paced and pretty interesting.
This DVD looks great and brings all the Euro decadence of the period to life. Ursula looks sensational and gives one of her best performances, if the Italian track is her, which it sounds like it is.
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Clever But Thin
Added 10/20/2007
According to film lore, actor Marcello Mastroianni was so impressed with a short-story by science-fiction author Robert Sheckley that he sent it to director Elio Petri. The result was a groundbreaking Italian film that alternately shocked and amused audiences of 1965--and which, like the 1976 NETWORK, proved prophetic re the rise of "reality television."
Set in a future imagined in terms of minimalist 1960s fashion and design movements, THE 10TH VICTIM (LA DECIMA VITTIMA) presents us with a world that has subliminated the human race's hunger for violence into a game known as "The Big Hunt." Register as a member and you become preditor and prey, with each player seeking to survive while killing ten others in order to win fame, fortune, and national acclaim.
American Caroline Meredith (Ursla Andress) is particularly celebrated and--after dispatching her ninth victim via her boobytrapped bra--is eager to win the grand prize by taking out her tenth: Italian Marcello Polletti (Marcello Mastroianni.) But an advertiser promises her even bigger bucks if she can turn it into a television ad for his product, creating a situation in which Caroline cannot simply kill Marcello at will: she must do it at a particular place and time where the cameras will be rolling.
In order to accomplish this, Caroline decides to seduce Marcello with both her body and the lure of cash--which he badly needs--for a television interview. Marcello is no fool, and even as Caroline plans to blow his head off for benefit of television he's signing his own advertising deal to accomplish her death by crocodile. But there's a further complication: even as they attempt to manouver each other into death, they also unwillingly fall in love.
THE 10TH VICTIM was extremely celebrated in 1965; today, however, it reads as slightly thin. We've become used to the idea of people who are willing to do just about anything on television, and the idea of murder by game show isn't nearly so farfetched as it used to be. The film scores, however, in its specific ideas, which range from exploding boots to a government that occasionally switches out your apartment's furniture whether you like it or not. The DVD transfer is quite nice, but bonuses are limited to cast notes and the theatrical trailer. Recommended, but mainly for fans of 1960s futurism who haven't lost their sense of humor!
GFT, Amazon Reviewer
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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Curious movie
Added 1/6/2007
This movie in true scifi form was quite ahead of its time as far as its theme goes, a tv show in which contestants become assassins of each other and earn a living that way. Last few years, a couple of American movies were made around the same topic. However, they don't have Ursula Andress and Marcello Mastroianni in it and that wonderful 60's wacky visual interpretation of what the future would look like.
Will it ever go this far on tv to satisfy the ever increasing and by the media itself ever stimulated need for thrills and kicks, without which people don't seem to be able to sense they're alive anymore or so we're given to believe? The cynical me and optimistic me have not finished that debate as yet to give an answer.
The acting in this movie is not exactly mindblowing and the movie's main subject is not exactly deeply explored, but it has a lot of curiosity value in that it is rather unique in its depiction of what may be in store for us and is quite entertaining at that.
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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a real 60's treat
Added 4/13/2006
Start with Marcello Mastroianni, Ursula Andress, and Elsa Martinelli, throw in a fun story and premise, incredibly stylish sets, and you have 60's classic camp. Add in Mastroianni's wonderful, dry wit and self-effacing manner, Andress's beauty and wardrobe, and the deal is done.
The story starts out in the ruins of Penn Station in NYC (demolished in order to put up the ghastly Madison Square Garden which now exists on the spot), which alone makes this DVD worth its reasonable price. It takes place in the future, in a world where violence and war have been eliminated, and human bloodthirst has been redirected towards The Hunt. Victims and hunters are assigned in Geneve and, should a member survive ten hunts, he will be set for life. This is the 10th hunt for both Marcello and Ursula, and the fun ensues as they flirt, deceive, trick, make love, and try to outdo each other in making hilarious commercials.
Pure fun, wonderful acting, beauty and style. Enjoy!
2 out of 2 people found this helpful.
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One of the better Bond-era relics....
Added 5/16/2003
This movie was made on VERY inexpensively, but a lot was made from that frugality! Marcello Mastroanni and Ursula Andress star in this sly satire on violence and population control. Their characters live in a 21st century world where an international game of cowboys and indians using real bullets and lethal devices has been authorized by the world government. The story focuses on them as Marcello tries to avoid being killed by Ursula in a game that trades off hunter and victim roles in a series of ten alternating runs, where the winner is finally awarded one million dollars.
Marcello plays a laid-back pauper in the game with nowhere near the resources of his "hunter", a jetset-style adventuress played by Andress. It's a comedy of errors and sixities fad satire as repo men come to exact a pound of flesh for the money Marcello owes them from past hunts, and he pleads with them not to take his priceless comic book collection, which includes Tom & Jerrys and Bug Bunnys, as well as Flash Gordon Dell editions.
The climax of the movie takes place on the set of a commercial orchestrated by the Andress character, Caroline, AND Marcello, (same first name as his character,) where Marcello is to pitch "Ming Tea" to the masses as he nails Caroline, seemingly, on the set of the show SHE put together, assuming her OWN victory!
The movie has one of the coolest jazz scores you'll ever hear, scat sung by a woman named Mina, accompanied by that typical, modern, Felliniesque pop organ. Elio Petri directs the two international stars and manages to make Rome look like it is, indeed, in the 21st century without spending a cent on special effects. (The killer bra Andress uses to kill her ninth victim is about it on that score, as a matter of fact!)
Marcello plays his role VERY tongue in cheek and a scene where he conducts a sun worshipping ceremony is one of the funniest you'll see in a sixties film...the scene has a LOT of relevance to the faddish religious mindset of 70s, 80s and 90s California culture.
Ursula is existential window-dressing, playing her part very laconically, but it's the SUPPORTING players that add a lot to this flick: The moon worshippers, Marcello's old trainer, Elsa Martinelli as Marcello's mistress and the fellow playing Marcello's agent/physician being prime examples.
The DVD, however, has almost NO extras! Just a couple of trailers and talent bios...no commentary by Petri, no outtakes, no director's cut, no nothin', no foolin'! It's a good thing I didn't have to spend more than a 10-spot for this baby, lemme tell ya. However, it's a fine film that shows what you can do with a small amount of money and a lot of talent. Just tell those fuels at Anchor Bay to load up a little more on the extras on any future release revisions of this title. I mean, it isn't even in hi-fi, much less STEREO!!
2 out of 2 people found this helpful.
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CLASSIC MONDO-ITALO-MODERNO SATIRE
Added 9/19/2002
... Saw this great, snazzy, jazzy, production-designed-heaven back in '76 on a double bill ... and was never able to forget it. So thrilled it's on video. OK, a bit dated here and there, but in ways it is still ahead of its time, and its got that great Piero Piccioni space-jazz score with Mina doing scat vocals, AND its got Marcello at his most suave-cool since "La Dolce Vita", AND its got Ursula Andress shooting bullets from her bra!... As always, gli italiani were way ahead of us in style and attitude, and it's evidenced herein. Only weak point of the film is the wrap-up, but such capers tended towards the flip in that day. The 10th Victim and director Pietro Germi was certainly prescient ... Soundtrack on EASY TEMPO records is also highly recommended.
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Rich and bored is not boring, or is it?
Added 3/27/2002
In a deadly 10 round spectator sport participants alternate between being hunters and hunted. Naturally, the huntress falls in love with the "victim" of her final round in this highly stylized Italian 60's parody.Until recently The 10th Victim has been worth seeing due to its strong futuristic aestetic value and black humor. However, now the theme of this movie can be seen in a new light. Today audiences - who are bored with staged nastyness - want to see the real thing. This they can find on a host of survival shows, where participants are encouraged to humiliate one another and themselves in various ways. One of the factors that has contributed to paving the way for such Reality TV are the many movies that predicted this form of entertainment. The 10th Victim is an early example.
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