Though he was still considered one of Italy's most important filmmakers on the basis of classics like Fists in the Pocket, onetime leftist filmmaker Marco Bellocchio was flailing a bit by the early '70s thanks to the hostile reception to his Catholic school satire from 1971, In the Name of the Father. He rebounded by essentially taking on a gun for hire job with Slap the Monster on Page One (Sbatti il mostro in prima pagina) for producer, Ugo Tucci, which was initially a giallo-style thriller about a murder case filtered through Italian newspaper coverage. The film's screenwriter, Sergio Donati (who had written multiple Sergio Leone westerns and The Weekend Murders), was intended to transition to directing with this project, but he departed claiming health issues but was reportedly clashing dramatically with star Gian Maria Volontè, the most aggressively Communist actor in Italy. The country's violent Years of Lead was in full force by this time, which proved to be a major factor in overhauling the script to reflect the tensions of the time and create an ideal vehicle for Volontè's intense screen presence.

Italy's upper class conservative population gets most of its news from Il Giornale (or The Newspaper), whose cynical editor-in-chief, Bizanti (Volontè), has no problem exploiting civil unrest for the gain-- including a political protest during the opening sequence that spills over into their office. When a female student is found raped and murdered, Bizanti seizes the opportunity to prop up their current candidate of choice, Montelli (Tenebrae's Steiner), by focusing public opinion against a leftist demonstrator through his ex-girlfriend, Rita (A Bay of Blood's Betti). One of his primary tools is young reporter Roveda (Garriba), whom he steers into covering the murder to get the desired result even if it means letting the real killer off the hook.

Whatever its genesis may have been, Slap the Monster on Page One emerges as a fascinating fusion of the social issue poliziotto film (a specialty of Franco Nero at the time) and dark political satires like Volontè's most famous film, 1970's Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion. Bellocchio brings back future Oscar-winning composer Nicola Piovani for one of his wilder scores with some effective use of organ and percussion (almost proto-Goblin in spots), and as always Volontè is magnetic as a thoroughly reprehensible media manipulator who sadly hasn't dated at all. Though it got some festival play, the film didn't get seen much outside of Europe and only made its way to most English-speaking viewers at first through fan-subbed bootleg editions of the Italian VHS or 2013 RaroVideo Italian DVD.

Fortunately anyone curious about the film can finally experience it in pristine quality thanks to the 2024 U.S. and U.K. edition from Radiance Films, which is sourced from a sterling 4K restoration from the original negative by Cineteca di Bologna in collaboration with Surf Film and Kavac Film, under the supervision of Bellocchio. This edition made its premiere at Cannes as part of a Bellocchio salute featuring a slew of restored features and short films (many now distributed by MUBI), and it's a fine presentation all around here with an equally satisfying LPCM 2.0 Italian mono track with improved optional English subtitles. The three video extras here start with an archival Bellocchio interview (19m39s) in which he looks back in detail at the circumstances of his career at the time, his overhauling of the script including the completely new Laura Betti character, and his own more moderate political stance at the time compared to the previous decade. An excellent new interview with critic and author Mario Sesti (24m47s) goes deep into Bellocchio's background before and during the tumultuous period that bred the film, the climate felt throughout the country, and the role of mainstream media in manipulating stories and doling out disinformation. Finally you get a cheerful video appreciation by filmmaker Alex Cox (9m53s) who dispels the odd rumor that the original script was a western and then sits offering an off-the-cuff commentary for a couple of sequences from the film. The package also comes with an insert booklet featuring an essay by Wesley Sharer laying out Bellocchio's importance at the time and how this film figures into a particularly volatile chapter in Italian history.

Reviewed on November 30, 2024.