Chicago Italian Film Club Meetup Group

 
 
 

Is it the perfect crime? Or is he just the right man to commit it? This month, we'll be diving into a kafkaesque murder investigation with the killer in plain view - join us as we take a look at Elio Petri's darkly comic crime commentary on bureaucracy and corruption ...
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INVESTIGATION OF A CITIZEN ABOVE SUSPICION ("Indagine su un cittadino al di sopra di ogni sospetto", 1970)
Dir. by Elio Petri
Available to rent on Amazon Prime, YouTube, or AppleTV

"Il Dottore" is the guy everyone else at the precinct looks up to. A recently promoted police captain, he is the very image of an upstanding member of society. His respect for the law is pristine! His speeches inspire! He ... has just murdered his mistress..? Well, there's no better man to lead the ensuing investigation than the top dog at the station, our model citizen Il Dottore himself. But covering up his tracks would be too easy - as the commandant-slash-killer heads up his own investigation, he becomes increasingly obsessed with leading his coworkers in the right direction, deliberately leaving behind a trail of clues that could lead the officers right to the culprit. But with all the arrows pointing towards the murderer's identity, will the cops ever accept that the killer could be one of their own?

A suspenseful crime melodrama that is absurd and acerbic in equal measure, Elio Petri's film asks a question that is sure to resonate just as strongly now as it did 50 years ago - is anyone truly above the law?
Let's talk about it!

*As a reminder, be sure to finish the film before coming to discussion!