It seems that most IMDb reviewers of this film have come to it because of its reputation as a 'mondo movie', but Faccia di spia is actually a serious attempt to tell the story of American foreign policy since the Second World War. It works periodically, but is let down by an overlong 'dramatic' section in the middle of the film about a reporter covering a Central American insurgency. At its best, Faccia di spia blends documentary footage of the CIA-funded coups against Jacobo Arbenz and Salvador Allende with dramatic recreations of those events. Some of the casting is remarkable: the actors depicting Allende, Augusto Pinochet, and Allen Dulles are impressive lookalikes. The film ends with a chillingly prescient animated sequence that may disturb some viewers as much as, if not more than, the (realistic and unexaggerated) torture sequences that earned this film a place in the Mondo Hall of Fame.
Review of Faccia di spia
