More sad news… Giulio Petroni died over the weekend. According to news reports in the Italian press:
Rome, January 31 – (Adnkronos) -The writer and director Giulio Petroni died in Rome at the age of 92. Petroni, who was born in September 1917, had been in hospital for a long time. Among his early work was a short film, Goethe a Roma. From 1951, he made an assortment of political documentaries, such as L’arte della Resistenza, Selinunte nastro bianco, Lembi di Albania in Calabria and Le strade verso Nord. He also worked as an assistant director on films such as Giuseppe De Santis’ Anna Zaccheo. His first feature film was 1959s La cento chilometri, which was soon followed by I piaceri dello scapolo, Una domenica d’estate and I soliti rapinatori a Milano. Petroni was best known for his westerns, including Da uomo a uomo, E per tetto un cielo di stelle, with Giuliano Gemma, and Tepepa, with Tomas Milian and Orson Welles, based on a screenplay by Franco Solinas. Petroni also worked with Rai TV channel and wrote novels.
For genre fans, of course, he’s an important figure, and three of his spaghetti westerns – Death Rides a Horse (Da uomo a uomo), Tepepa and La notte dei serpenti – are among the best of their type. Unfortunately, he didn’t make as many films as perhaps his talent merited, and outside the western genre his successes were more limited.