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This short vignette starts with the morning routine of an ordinary, middle-aged British gentleman. His life appears without excitement and he is content attending to the little demands of his home and afterwards walking to his regular coffee shop for his breakfast. In the coffee shop he sits and watches others in the shop and those walking past the window, something which he and countless others have been doing during their uneventful lives. He strolls to a park where he seats himself on a bench, watching with detachment the activities of the people passing. Just when the movie-viewer is lulled into watching these boring sequence of events, he is suddenly startled by an expression of severe anxiety on Mr Smith's face. Amidst the contortions, Mr Smith takes out a pistol and places it against his temple. With a last grimace, he shoots himself. After watching this movie, one looks at other seemingly contented people and wonders what hidden trigger lies within them to perhaps end their lives. This movie was shown as a preliminary to Andy Warhol's Bad in a West Ealing,London, cinema. The combination is not for the sensitive viewer.

When I saw this movie for the first time I was stunned by its stark, under-emphasized sequences against the background of an equally stark, contrasting dessert.It is then that you realize that this is another Italian masterpiece, with the same menacing opening scenes as the Clint Eastwood Italian Westerns. No racing motorcars, no shouting policemen, no arguing couples, just pure quintessential drama without frills. This movie must not be allowed to disappear in obscurity. From Sahara dessert to Spain, the last scenes where the assassin moves closer to Locke, are also set amidst equally contrasting stark Spanish architecture. The sense of desolation is an appropriate conclusion to the futility of Locke's life. In the end he is deserted by his lover (Maria Schneider), and the only person loyal to him, his wife, arrives too late to save him.

I am wondering if this is the same 'Verdi' I saw in 1960? It begins with the most dramatic opening scene I have ever seen in a movie. Late at night a carriage passes through the city, but the cobbled surface is covered with straw. A passenger calls out to the coachman, "What is all the straw doing on the road?" The coachman bends over, and with his finger across his lips, whispers: "The maestro is dying." The scene then changes to a window, through which one sees Verdi on his deathbed. Later, another scene with the first performance of Nabucco. During the Slaves' Chorus, the whole Italian audience rises to shout defiance at the Hapsburg rulers and demand their independence.

Great stuff, but is it the same Verdi?