Comedian Enrico Montesano stars as Caleb, the good thief of the title. Not good in the sense of stealing from the rich and giving to the poor, but in that his escapades are funny. A contemporary of Jesus Christ (played by Claudio Cassinelli), Caleb is convinced that Jesus is a con artist just like him, and becomes jealous of his more accomplished 'tricks' and tries to copy them.
From start to finish Caleb makes his inner-thoughts known by way of narration, revealing that the film is based on a novel, by Pasquale Festa Campanile. Naturally, the view of Christ presented therein caused quite a stir when the book came out. As director however, Campanile avoids most of the controversial parts and concentrates on the saucy bits instead.
Practically every woman who meets Caleb falls for him, even though he often mentions how much he smells during his aforementioned voice-over. The one woman who proves to be his match is Edwidge Fenech as Deborah, a hooker (cured of leprosy by Christ). Despite of her profession, Fenech' nude scenes are kept to a bare minimum (though still pictures reveal at least one more scene of Caleb and Deborah in bed that doesn't appear in the film). Apart from Edwige, there are many beautiful shots of the landscape (filmed in her homeland Tunisia) and Ennio Morricone serves up one of his 'comical' scores.
However at 110 minutes, Il Ladrone rather overstays his welcome. The story is really a collection of (mostly) comic set pieces. Many subplots and diversions could easily have been left out and the occasionally crude humor does not fit with the more serious parts about Caleb's envy for Christ. For example, a sad scene involving the death of Caleb's dog Joshua at the hands of evil Romans is followed up by a very silly bit with him taking revenge by selling an 'invisibility cream' to the killer.
7 out of 10
