Mafia foot soldier Salvo carries out the ruthless assassination of a rival only to discover someone else in the house: Rita, a young blind woman. Sparing her life leads to a bond between the two souls, haunted by their shared world that changes them both forever. Salvo is a unique Italian-style homage to the French legendary filmmaker Jean-Pierre Melville’s gangster films. The mafia foot soldier, who moves like a machine, and the sound of the entire film recalls the French director’s universe. Following the intense gunfire at the beginning, the long sequence of the man and woman meeting for the first time is filled with strained silence, this silence in turn replaced by nonverbal sounds such as breath and clock as in Melville’s films. What is notable is the Italian directors’ reinvention. The Italian theme song, the wasteland in Palermo and the woman who miraculously opens her eyes represent definitely their own universe. This film won the Grand Prize of the Critics’ Week in Cannes. (RHEE Soue-won)