A deeply personal work of exploitation by a guy whose big Hollywood dream was to honor the traditions of his culture and who was simultaneously enthralled by and suspicious of its (mis)representation in movies. One of the greatest mafia films ever made.

Duke Mitchell might not have been a conventionally great filmmaker but now that I've seen both of his films I think I can say that he did bring something distinctive to the table, a unique balance between exploitation-mode need to entertain and something much more personal and meaningful. Here he's gotta give the audience what they want, slaughter and sex and one-liners, but he throws in some thoughtful monologues about the Italian-American experience. It's inconsistent and sloppy, but hey, so is lasagna! I mean, life. Life is inconsistent and sloppy.

"You boys have been watching too many Humphrey Bogart movies."

When you're tired of nobody representing you properly on screen, steal a fucking camera and do it your goddamn self.

Duke Mitchell had something he felt needed to be said and he had a voice with which to say it. Dismiss him as a crank, dismiss this movie as low-brow exploitation, dismiss the shaky performances, but don't deny his sincerity or his personality. Mitchell's writing is phenomenal, his performance is cool as all get out, and he has a knack for building montages over contrapuntal music. Maybe the signal to noise ratio isn't so great. Mitchell's relatively amateur status as a director, the low budget, and the commercial need to include more scenes of gun violence than are really necessary to tell a thematically cogent story are all handicaps. I'm not complaining: I think this and Gone with the Pope are masterpieces. So sue me.

This is a blaxploitation film but for Italians and instead of “all of movie history” it’s about how this one lounge singer didn’t like The Godfather.

And its honestly great.

Writer/director/producer Duke Mitchell (fake Dean Martin from Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla) was concerned that movies like The Godfather were portraying Italians in a negative and violent way, so he made a movie which is mostly about him murdering people.

Interesting but somewhat hard to review mafia movie.

See, the story is kinda interesting; Entertainer Duke Mitchell self-financed this to make a hard-hitting mafia/gangster flick all the while trying to say something about the depiction of mafia in mainstream culture and the perception of Sicilians/Italians in the US. And I respect that, I appreciate that.

But.., and I can't put my finger on what exactly it is, but it is lacking in something. Mitchell isn't per se a good filmmaker, and this definitely isn't per se a good movie, it's just, its heart is definitely in the right place and you feel that throughout. But, again, that doesn't change the fact that purely based on its entertainment value, it doesn't fully work for me. But hey, definitely not bad.

One of the greatest pieces of exploitation cinema.

Unfassbar liebenswerte Kuriosität, von Duke Mitchell als Regisseur, Produzent, Autor, Komponist und Hauptdarsteller ohne nennenswertes Budget aber mit Herzblut auf Zelluloid geschrieben. Mimi Micelis (Mitchell) finaler Monolog über das Verlust mafiösen Ehrgefühls in der Ära freier Liebe und schicker Drogen gehört mit zum Schönsten, was das amerikanische Independentkino der 70er Jahre zu bieten hat.

Great exploitation flick. If you take the action sequences and replace the music with The Kinks, you'd totally think you're watching a Wes Anderson movie.

One of the most unapologetically batshit things I've ever seen.

This homage/satire (I truly don't know) of the American mafia epic is just, it's just so much. Of everything. Wanton violence, gratuitous T&A, absolutely inane dialogue. I could write a whole review on the dialogue alone; it was so intensely preposterous and in a different way than your typical grindhouse/b-movie fare.

I could also write a whole review on the violence, which comes hard, fast and wholly without warning. We're talking revolvers that can fire 30 shots without reloading, hip-firing that somehow has Olympic shooting accuracy and a general feeling of shoot-first-ask-questions-never.

I loved it. I loved all of it.

I like my cheesy schlocky films but wow this is a big large horse vitamin pill to swallow

"You’re IN, or you’re IN THE WAY."
MASSACRE MAFIA STYLE aka LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON (this is actually an appropriate title considering the ending) was produced, written and directed by Duke Mitchell plus he also played the main character, a sleazebag mobster called Mimi Miceli. It's basically an exploitation version of THE GODFATHER, full of violence and sleaze. The acting is often unintentionally funny, which creates an odd charm compared to the brutality. I'm pretty convinced that Quentin Tarantino has been influenced by this flick.

Amazing fun

Schlecht geskripteter und pathetischer, aber in seiner naiven Unbeholfenheit auch sehr charmanter B-Gangsterfilm von Selfmade-Filmemacher und Entertainer Duke Mitchell.

This is a blaxploitation film but for Italians and instead of “all of movie history” it’s about how this one lounge singer didn’t like The Godfather.

And its honestly great.

The Grindhouse Releasing disc is absolutely loaded.

One of the purest expressions of the exploitation ethos of all-time, Mafia Massacre Style is both a shameless rip-off and a deeply personal work from a guy who wasn't buying what Hollywood was selling. And the best way to combat that is to sell your own version of the story, even if you aren't a refined filmmaker. What matters is that Duke Mitchell was a natural storyteller, and this movie spins a yarn adorned with squibs and sleaze, so much so that the audience is completely disarmed by the end, unaware that Johnson has loaded one last bullet in the chamber for the shocking finale. Just a completely fascinating piece of work.