In Italy, they call this movie Il cinico, l'infame, il violento, which means The Cynic, the Infamous, the Violent. This poliziotteschi is a sequel to another Umberto Lenzi film, 1976's The Tough Ones, with Maurizio Merli playing the role of Inspector Leonardo Tanzi in both movies.

Luigi "The Chinaman" Maietto (Tomas Milan, The Big Gundown, Django Kill... If You Live, Shoot!) escapes from prison and sends two of his men to kill the man who put him away - Tanzi. He's left for dead and even the newspapers print that he's dead, but he's just biding his time, waiting to get revenge.

Tanzi just wanted to stay retired - it looks like he's become a giallo author - but now he's a vigilante who comes up against Maietto and American syndicate boss Frank Di Maggio (John Saxon).

This movie boasts three writers whose work pretty much hits every side of the Italian exploitation experience. There's Lenzi himself, who made everything from Eurospy films (Super Seven Calling Cairo, The Spy Who Loved Flowers, 008: Operation Exterminate),Westerns (A Pistol for a Hundred Coffins),giallo (Orgasmo, A Quiet Place to KIll, Oasis of Fear, So Sweet...So Perverse, Seven Bloodstained Orchids, Spasmo, Eyeball),cannibal movies (Man from Deep River, Cannibal Ferox),peplum (Ironmaster, Samson and the Slave Queen),horror (Nightmare Beach, Ghosthouse, Demons 3, Hitcher in the Dark) and so much more. Then you have Ernesto Gastaldi, who wrote so many films that I love, including The Whip and the Body, The Possessed, The Sweet Body of Deborah, Day of Anger, All the Colors of the Dark, Torso, My Name is Nobody and tons of other great films. And then there's Dardano Sacchetti, who wrote just about any Italian genre film worth watching.

Man, somehow Junesploitation has led me to many Italian crime films. For this I am very excited!

With "The Cynic, the Rat and the Fist", Umberto Lenzi proved once more what he had already proven numerous times before, namely that he was Italy's greatest and hardest-working crime-movie director! Even during the second half of the 70s decade, when the heydays of the Poliziotesschi were actually over already, Lenzi still made a handful of downright awesome genre classics. "The Cynic, the Rat and the Fist" is even one of the best Poliziotesschi ever, with a very eventful but nevertheless solid script, no less than three of the finest contemporary lead actors and a truckload of impressively staged action footage. The title, and quite many of the themes as well, are obvious (and sublime) references towards Sergio Leone's landmark western "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly". However, in Leone's film, it was unmistakably clear who was who, whereas here the three main protagonists are never referred to with one of the aliases/nicknames of the title and it's not all that obvious to guess, neither! I presume Maurizio Merli - Tanzi the good guy - is "the Fist", since he's battling the organized crime in Rome with his bare vigilante hands now that he quit the police. I also daresay John Saxon's character Di Maggio is "the Rat", since his filthy mafia activities infest the entire city like a disease. And finally, Tomas Milian - in a truly superb performance - is probably "the Cynic" because, well, he's one of the cruelest and most relentless villains to ever appear on screen (just look at the hospital execution sequences for evidence).

Great movie, ditto soundtrack and particularly the sequences that feature Tomas Milian and John Saxon together rank as some of the most powerful ones in Italian cult cinema history!

A fast-paced, action-fuelled Italian "polizia" movie which is certainly regarded to be one of Umberto Lenzi's best and almost up there with his own previous VIOLENT NAPLES. It's action from the word go with this film which never lets up, offering fist fights, shoot-outs and chases in equal measure right from the very beginning. Of course with movies of this variety, it's not really the plot (which is interchangeable with a dozen others) which is important but the way the film is made: with great, catchy and jazzy music, fine acting from three genre veterans, occasionally hilarious tough dialogue and more action than in any American equivalent, the story is not of importance, a simple retread of the plot of YOJIMBO but with a harder and more sadistic edge.

This film offers up the usual criminal activities, from protection rackets, robberies, prostitution rackets and murder; although not as gruesome as VIOLENT NAPLES, Lenzi gives us a hard-edged golf ball torture scene that isn't to be forgotten, and a scene where a man's leg is broken in excruciating detail. The fight scenes are well-staged and enjoyable to watch, the chases (including a rooftop battle) are exciting and well choreographed. None of the scenes drag at all, the pacing is spot on and the film is largely coherent.

Maurizio Merli returns to his (somewhat clichéd) role of the tough cop who doesn't take any grief from anybody. Also appearing are Tomas Milian as a slimy, long-haired gangster who double-crosses and tortures people, and John Saxon as a short-tempered rival gangster who spends most of his time swearing and shouting when things don't go according to plan. Glamour is lent by the beautiful Gabriella Lepori who spends most of her scenes getting beaten up! With a high death toll and lots of assorted bloodshed and violence, Lenzi's film is impossible not to like and oozes style in every scene. A highlight of the Italian genre that is highly recommended to all.