Sybil Danning’s Adventure Video: Mean Frank and Crazy Tony (1973)

Tony Breda (Tony Lo Bianco) is a well-respected local in his Italian town, but he’s also a small-time crook with a massive weak spot: he completely idolizes Italo-American mobster Frankie Diomede (Lee Van Cleef), a legendary figure known as “Dio” (“God”). You’ll get it once you see the first few moments of Van Cleef in this movie, as he’s

When Tony reads that Frank has traveled back to Genoa to dismantle a rival operation run by Louis Annunziata (Jean Rochefort), he bursts into action. He tracks Frank to a high-society villa party and tries to make his move. Instead of welcoming the fandom, Frank calmly calls the cops on the illegal gambling happening inside, engineering his own arrest. Convinced that rescuing his idol will make him a made man for life, Tony tries to drag Frank out as sirens wail, resulting in both of them getting locked up.

Behind bars, Frank uses a paid guard to slip out at night, knock off a rival and slip back in, only for Tony to catch him in the act. When a sniper tries to take Frank out from a rooftop, Tony throws himself into the fray to save his hero’s life. That act of pure loyalty finally cracks Frank’s stoic exterior. Things escalate when Frank’s respectable doctor brother is murdered by Annunziata’s crew while trying to hand over incriminating syndicate files. Seizing the moment, Tony orchestrates a daring prison break during a transfer by staging a car crash, leading the cops on a wild, chaotic truck chase across the border into Marseilles.

The duo hits Annunziata’s operation at a fish processing warehouse, where the syndicate is smuggling heroin inside gutted fish bound for the United States. A fierce shootout ensues, during which Tony pulls his weight, though he breaks down in distress after pulling the trigger for the first time in his life. Frank mercifully covers for him, assuring Tony that his bullet wasn’t the fatal one. Frank then corners Annunziata and locks him inside a cold storage room, dropping the temperature to a chilling end. With the job done, Frank arranges a boat to Tunisia for himself, but gives Tony some hard-earned wisdom: the gritty underworld isn’t for him. Tony heads home, hangs up his criminal ambitions and tells his old crew to walk the straight and narrow.

That’s easy to say when Edwige Fenech is in love with you.

The film had a wild ride in international markets, known variously by its Italian titles Il suo nome faceva tremare… Interpol in allarme and Dio, sei proprio un padreterno!, while landing in English-speaking territories under titles like Power Kill, Mobster’s Revenge, Escape from Death Row and The Cold Arms of Death.

Director Michele Lupo made everything from peplum sword-and-sandal epics to classic Spaghetti Westerns like Arizona Colt and stellar action-comedies featuring the powerhouse duo Bud Spencer and Terence Hill.

You can watch this on YouTube.