Property Is No Longer a Theft

Property Is No Longer a Theft (La proprietà non è più un furto, 1973) is Elio Petri's savage Italian satire, and you can watch online on iFILM. Total, a young bank clerk, suffers from an absurd condition: he is allergic to money. Paper bills literally burn his skin on contact.

So he quits the bank and picks a target — a rich, swaggering butcher who handles cash without a shred of conscience. Total never robs the man outright. Instead he pesters him, swipes small possessions, sabotages deals and circles his mistress until the businessman's life curdles. Ugo Tognazzi plays the butcher as pure appetite, and the duel between two obsessives turns into a poisonous parable about ownership, power and who devours whom.

This is the closing chapter of Petri's so-called "neurosis trilogy" that began with Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion. Brechtian asides to the camera, grotesque comedy and a prickly Ennio Morricone score keep the film deliberately uncomfortable — built for viewers who want political satire with teeth, not reassurance. Stream Property Is No Longer a Theft (1973) online on iFILM.