Hey Guess What! It’s a small world! I went up to a birthday party this weekend, about 200 miles up the coast, central california, my wife was talking to a couple and naturally I butted in and one thing led to another, we were talking about tomatoes, then Italy, how he lived there for 15 years, how he went there in 1968 with just a backpack, how he starred in over 30 films!! His name is Leonard Manzella, but he acted under Leonard Mann. Some of his films are: Napoli Spara, one of my all time favorite polizotos, a couple spaghetti westerns,La Vendetta è un piatto che si serve freddo (Revenge Is A Dish Served Cold), Il Pistolero dell’Ave Maria (The Last Pistolero),a scifi L’Umanoide, (The Humanoid),and many others. Anyway we talked about Italian films and how they made them back in the 70’s. Something I’m very interested in, the atmosphere, the milleau of Roma 1968. A super creative time in world Cinema, a flowering of creativity, a new Renaisannce. I am going to interview Leonard soon and post it as a podcast so you all can hear it for yourselves. I also want to do a posting on the techniques of Italian film production (1960’s/70’s) style. So anybody that wants to can make a film Italian Style. So uncork a bottle of Nebbiolo, kick back and check out a film starring Leonard Mann, Napoli Spara is unavailable right now but I’m going to do everything I can to get it released here! In the meantime here’s a lobby card I found over at Stephen Grimes site- http://stephengrimes.blogspot.com/
I found this BAD review of Sergio Leone’s great western For A Few Dollars More. It’s from an old copy of Time magazine. It perfectly illustrates the smug, superior attitude that Italian B movies have been subjected to. The idiot that wrote this review actually puts down Ennio Morricone’s magnificent score! I am posting this to make a point. Anything new or different is initially put down. If people don’t understand something they want to destroy it. But time has proven the Time reviewer wrong. Unfortunately the piece is unsigned, otherwise we could set the reviewer’s house on fire and shoot him when he comes running out! Just like the Rojo’s in A Fistfull of Dollars (which this review also puts down). Read full entry to see the complete review…
Sergio Corbucci’s masterpiece Navajo Joe or A Dollar A Head will screen at the 2007 Venice Film Festival. I’ve always loved this film, partially due to the incredible Ennio Morricone soundtrack, featuring the amazing Alessandro Alessandroni, Gianna Spagnulo, and The Cantori Moderni, Alessandroni’s choir. The screenplay is co-authored by Fernando De Leo who later went on to direct some of the best polizotto or crime films of the 70’s, like Il Boss and The Italian Connection and Milano Calibre 9. I also must applaud Burt Reynolds, he did all his own stunts and it is one of the most impressive physical performance’s of all time. To top it off the film has an ambiguous ending, unlike anything I can recall and subsequentially one of my favorites. The only other film ending that struck me in a similar way (although completely different) is Luis Bunuel’s Diary of a Chambermaid and that ending was not ambiguous but surreal, completely out of character with the rest of the film. On reflection the ending of Tristana falls into this classification as well.
