The Designated Victim

A true high point in 70s Italian thriller cinema, this inspired remake of Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train from director Maurizio Lucidi is able to push the concept of the original movie into something far more unbearably tense and deliciously twisted.

Stefano (Tomas Milian; Traffic, Amistad, JFK) needs to sort out his troublesome wife who is seriously cramping his future plans. A chance meeting with a wealthy Count Matteo (Pierre Clementi) leads to an extraordinary plan where both will do each other a murderous favour to free them from the people who ail them. The problem is Stefano treats this as a joke whilst Matteo is deadly serious and what he does drives Stefano to the edge of sanity in a gripping race against time!

Shot in a mist-wreathed eerily beautiful Venice this near dream-like melding of thriller with baroque giallo overtones has remained until now a criminally hidden gem.