La Decima Vittima

"The 10th Victim" is a 1965 Italian/French science fiction film directed by Elio Petri. It is based on Robert Sheckley's 1953 short story "Seventh Victim". It's set in the near future where there are large wars going on, and the only way they know to hold them up is to give people with violent tendencies a chance to kill in the 'Big Hunt'. The Hunt is a form of entertainment in this fictional world, where people looking for fame and fortune participate in ten rounds each, five as a hunter and 5 as a victim. The survivor of ten rounds becomes very wealthy and retires.

The protagonist, Marcello, an assassin in a loveless marriage with his wife, finds himself the target of a female assassin called Caroline. The film looks at the relationship between these two and how Marcello is reluctant to kill her as he is not sure whether she is his hunter, and they eventually become romantically involved. To maximize financial gain, Caroline wants to get a perfect kill in front of the cameras as she has negotiated a major sponsor from the 'Ming Tea Company'.

I personally loved the concept and setting of the film, but I think the narrative could have used some work and I would like to see a more modern version of it. I think the film helped to encourage 'live-action games', which are games that take place in real life and on a bigger scale. The most prominent example of these and one that we looked closely at is 'The Assassin Game', which I feel was directly influenced by the film; in this game people are randomly assigned another participant to 'assassinate' (pretend to kill). The game is fairly popular worldwide in different Universities and videos of it can be found online.