September 3, 2016 The Masked Man Against the Pirates The Masked Man Against the Pirates is a fairly standard pirate drama, fitting nicely alongside such titles as Roberto Mauri’s Flag of Death (I Pirata del diavolo, 63) and Don Sharp’s Pirates of Blood River (62).
August 21, 2016 Fairytale Given the rather unpromising subject matter – a film about a haunted wardrobe, whoop-di-do – Fairytale, a 2012 film directed by Christian Bisceglia and Ascanio Malgarini, isn’t all that bad.
August 18, 2016 Due mafiosi contro Goldginger Aka Operacion Relampago (Es), Zwei Trottel gegen Goldfinger (WG), Amazing Doctor G, The (US unconfirmed), Two Mafiosi Against Goldfinger (US unconfirmed) 1965 Italy/Spain Edmondo…
July 23, 2016 Elio Petri: A Quiet Place in the Country Ostensibly a ghost story, A Quiet Place in the Country is, in fact, an atmospheric rumination upon the nature of art, pornography, insanity and – heck – life itself.
July 17, 2016 War Games (At the End of the Day) War Games (2011) fits in neatly with a handful of other Italian films which followed the survivalist horror template and were made at around the same time (Shadow, In the Market).
June 21, 2016 Day of the Siege I’m all for any attempt to revive that venerable cinematic form that is the Italian peplum, but by any stretch of the imagination Day of the Siege ain’t the film that’s going to do it.
May 20, 2016 Elio Petri: Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion For 1969’s Investigation of a Citizen above Suspicion, Elio Petri turned his eye to the then nascent urban crime thriller, a genre that reflected – and some would say preyed upon – the political and economic uncertainties rife in Metropolitan Italy at the time.