Italy – Page 2 – The Magnificent 60s

Come September (1961) ***

The quite superb concept that underpins the traditional unsettling of Rock Hudson is sabotaged by the inclusion of an unnecessary generation gap element and because one of the youngsters is singer Bobby Darin that throws a musical spanner into the works. The basic set-up is that Lisa (Gina Lollobrigida), the Italian lover of wealthy American Robert (Rock Hudson), is fed up with the part-time nature of their relationship. Although their affair dates back six years, it only lasts for the one month (September) he vacations each year in his luxurious villa on the Ligurian coast.

She’s so annoyed at his lack of commitment that she’s about to marry posh Englishman Spencer (Ronald Howard), that imminent event only put off by the unexpected earlier-than-usual arrival of Robert. Matters are further complicated because his enterprising Italian butler Maurice (Walter Slezak) hires out the villa to paying guests for the other eleven months. To explain the owner’s sudden arrival, Maurice persuades his guests to go along with the notion that Robert is a former owner fallen on hard times deluded into thinking he still possesses the property.

The guests are a gaggle of young women, including psychology major Sandy (Sandra Dee) who proceeds to analyze Robert, and they are herded around by formidable chaperone Margaret (Brenda de Banzie) who prevents Lisa sneaking into her lover’s bedroom.

So enough plot to be getting on with. You’d assume Spencer is going to turn up, maybe with his equally formidable sisters, to cause ructions at the villa. Lisa appears to enjoy making Robert wait the way he has kept her wait, so a gentle shift in power, and there’s going to be an inevitable bust-up so we expect a quick shift into the will-she-won’t-she scenario. Plus, there’s the whole issue of Robert claiming back his villa and dealing with the over-entrepreneurial Maurice.

Instead, the second act enters a whole new realm. Unless one of the girls was going to make a play for Robert, there’s not much reason for them to be there except for the nuisance value and to allow Margaret to flex her authority. An unwelcome quartet of young men, led by Tony (Bobby Darin), embark on the equally unwelcome task of wooing of the young ladies, Tony having his eyes on Sandy. Although various romantic entanglements are enacted, that’s not what takes center stage.

Instead, the bulk of the middle section scarcely involves the Robert-Lisa quandary and instead it’s devoted to an endless battle between Tony and Robert as the younger specimen attempts to prove he is mentally and physically superior. Now the one element that had made these Rock Hudson comedies work was his helplessness. He may occasionally be smart or wealthy but the whole point of these stories was for a woman to run rings around him or at the very least drag him way out of his comfort zone.

Seeing Robert best Tony – endlessly – takes the shine off the picture and it’s not until Robert is revealed as a sanctimonious hypocrite, living by a double standard, that the movie catches fire again as Lisa storms off in a huff and we can settle down to some good old-fashioned will-she-won’t-she.

This proves a very successful change of pace for Gina Lollobrigida, and she reveals herself to be such a splendid comedienne that it became part of her repertoire – reunited with Hudson for Strange Bedfellows (1965) and leading a pack of men a merry dance in Buona Sera Mrs Campbell (1968).

There’s nothing particularly wrong with Rock Hudson. He’s good comedy value, but the second act ruins it. Bobby Darin (Pressure Point, 1962) and Sandra Dee (A Man Could Get Killed, 1966) act as if they’re in a completely different movie, of the frothy beach variety. Walter Slezak (The Caper of the Golden Bulls, 1967) is an adept scene-stealer. Look out for Joel Grey (Cabaret, 1972) in an early role and Brenda de Banzie (I Thank a Fool, 1962).

Directed by Robert Mulligan (The Stalking Moon, 1969) with a screenplay by Oscar-winning Stanley Shapiro (Bedtime Story, 1964) and Maurice Richlin (All in a Night’s Work, 1961).

A hybrid that rocks the wrong boat.

An Angel for Satan / The Devil’s Angel (1966) ***

Scream Queen Barbara Steele (The Crimson Cult / Cult of the Crimson Altar, 1968) is the big attraction in this heady brew of witchcraft, ancient curse, hypnotism and plain ordinary seduction, with an ingenious double twist. And elegantly mounted, crisply photographed as if a Hollywood picture of the 1940s.

After a drought lowers the water level, a 200-year-old statue of the beautiful Countess Melena is recovered from the seabed. The locals fear it carries a curse. Artist Roberto (Anthony Steffen), hired to restore the artwork, arrives only days before the young countess Harriet (Barbara Steele) returns to claim her inheritance. With some clever sleight-of-hand, veteran Italian director Camillo Mastrocinque (Crypt of the Vampire, 1964) misleads the audience into thinking this is all about secret love affairs, Harriet’s uncle the Count (Claudio Gora) in an illicit relationship with housekeeper Ilda (Marina Berti), maid Rita (Ursula Davis) tempting timid schoolteacher Dario (Vassilli Karis), nascent love between Harriet and Roberto hitting a stumbling block and various shades of unshackled lust from woodcutter Vittorio (Aldo Berti) and village strong man Carlo (Mario Brega).

But pretty quickly, the picture takes a different turn. Turns out it’s not Melena who’s the problem – but her jealous ugly cousin Belinda who threw the statue into the water in the first place. Whatever the cause, there’s an outbreak of malevolence, mostly emanating from Harriet.

She strips naked for Carlo then savagely beats him for daring to stare at the nude body. She seduces Dario, looks like she’s making a play for Rita, goads Roberto and tells him she likes violence and has Carlo in her thrall.

In short order a female villager is raped and murdered, another barely escaping a similar fate, the schoolteacher commits suicide, several villagers are axed to death, the strong man sets fire to his cottage, killing wife and seven children, and the woodcutter is speared by pitchforks.

You can tell this is a classier number because the violence is minus any gore and there’s little attempt at deliberate shock, more of a slow burn as Harriet torments those around her. Roberto is permitted small touches of investigation, and there’s a clever special effect of a painting appearing to talk.

The traditional horror elements – lightning, slamming windows, storms – are primarily employed to nudge Harriet and Roberto together; it just so happens that she is scared of lightning and he’s the person most conveniently placed to comfort her. There’s a hint of the narcissism found in Hammer’s later lesbian horror pictures, and only the censor or the director’s discretion prevents more full-blown nudity as a prelude to seduction of both male and female. Harriet’s a dab hand at inveigling males to be in the wrong place at the wrong time invariably with her clothes in disarray to lend substance to her claims of being attacked.

While, as regular readers will know, I’m generally in favour of the climactic twist – the more the merrier – here I’m not so sure this was the road to go down. As Roberto already knows that the curse applies to wicked cousin Belinda rather than Melena, it would have been enough for him to declare this and find a way of removing it, most likely adopting the simple solution of chucking the statue back in the sea, which is what the villagers have been demanding all along.

It’s quite clear that much of the rape and killing is down to hypnotism by Harriet, but once we discover she’s being hypnotized by the Count, in one fell swoop what had been an intriguing horror story transforms into a more run-of-the-mill crime tale since if Harriett is committed to an asylum then he can continue to rule the roost.

But he’s in the thrall of Ilda who turns out to be the ancestor of Belinda. So not quite the satisfactory ending unless the criminal element had been introduced earlier on.

I doubt if Barbara Steele fans will care as the actress is very much in her element and, although in the end a victim, for the bulk of the picture she is in total – and seductive – command. Nobody’s going to compete with her and sensibly nobody tries. Anthony Steffen didn’t need any help with his career because had had already headed down the spaghetti western route.

Classically directed – excellent composition and camera movement – from a script by Mastrocinque and Giuseppe Mangione (Anzio / Battle for Anzio, 1968) from a novel by Antonio Fogazarro.

Superior stuff in which Barbara Steele shines.

The Evil Eye / The Girl Who Knew Too Much (1963) ***

Don’t be taken in by claims that, since it was directed by Mario Bava, it kicked off the giallo sub-genre. More of the tropes come from mainstream horror – windows banging shut, locked doors, disembodied voices, stalkers, gaslighting, mysterious phone calls, premonition, retrocognition. And just for good measure, striking compositions that wouldn’t be out of place in an arthouse picture. But essentially it’s neo-noir – a woman can’t prove she’s witnessed a murder.

The Evil Eye was the American title, which makes little sense, although eye-popping eyes were in fashion from movies like Village of the Damned (1960), but in fact the original title of The Girl Who Knew Too Much is much more appropriate. This film is about a female character and what she discovers that threatens her life. The American version was chopped about by the distributor but, apparently, copies of that have gone astray so if locate a copy of the picture what you are likely to see if the Italian original.

American tourist Nora (Leticia Roman) is knocked out by a robber in Rome. On waking up she sees a murderer sticking a knife into a woman’s back. Only problem is – there’s no corpse to be found. But, strangely, a murder was committed on that spot a decade ago. So she might be having a vision of the past. But the murderer Straccianeve was caught.

The victim was the sister of Laura (Valentina Cortese), a new friend, whose apartment Nora temporarily occupies. There, Laura discovers newspaper clippings relating to the “alphabet killer”, a serial murderer whose victims’ surnames began with A, B, and C. Once Nora begins her investigations, it looks like she’ll be next on the list since her surname begins with “D”. Meanwhile, she has struck a romantic vibe with Dr Marcello Bassi (John Saxon). But, of course, he might be not what he seems, sneaking off for assignations with strange women, following her.

Much of this is played out on deserted streets where the tourist sites acquire a dangerous veneer.

The finger points at journalist Landini (Dante DiPaulo), who has been following her. But he is as much a basket case as a potential murderer. He was instrumental in collecting the evidence that trapped the murderer but now believes Straccianeve was innocent.

In due course, after some more deaths, Nora traps the murderer, who comes out of left field, one of those where you think the writer has decided to pin the blame on the least likely suspect and come up with a spurious reason for the murders, so the twists pile up in helter skelter fashion at the end, including one which suggests Nora might well have the gift of seeing into the future.

Leticia Roman, in her debut, is mostly called upon to look baffled or frightened, there’s rather too much of the pop-eyes, and John Saxon (The Appaloosa, 1966) has the rare opportunity to play a hero. Valentina Cortese (Barabbas, 1961) drifts in and out of the tale. Written by future director Sergio Corbucci (Django, 1966), Oscar-winner Ennio De Concini (Divorce, Italian Style, 1963) and Eliana De Sabato (Marco Polo, 1962).

If it hadn’t been directed – and occasionally so stylishly – by Mario Bava (The Whip and the Body, 1963), it would have attracted considerably less contemporary attention. One of this main themes – the conflict between illusion and reality – is given a good airing. You can well believe that Nora is going mad. But it’s atmospheric enough and the director makes unusual use of the standard Rome tourist traps and this picture gives notice that he will move onto greater movies.

Buona Sera Mrs Campbell (1968) ****

Works a treat. And works like clockwork, the set-up so meticulous, it doesn’t put a comedic foot wrong and even allows space, at exactly the right time, for the ticking timebomb to be sorted out. Gags galore. Sight gags, sound gags and observational gags, but most, unusually, are snippy, the kind of sharp remarks that people make under tension. And, heaven help us, there’s farce, and that works, too. It rarely does in American movies because it’s usually an adaptation of a Broadway play and the movie director feels hidebound by stage conventions. Here, this is an original screenplay, so writer-director Melvin Frank (Strange Bedfellows, 1963) works to his own beat.

You’ll remember the “who’s the father” narrative ploy from Mamma Mia (2008) – though this preceded the Abba bash by four decades. Twenty years after the Yanks liberated an Italian village in World War Two they are back to commemorate the event. Amongst the soldiers, three men desperate to meet the daughter, Gia (Janet Margolin), they each think they sired with Carla (Gina Lollobrigida) and have been supporting with monthly cheques ever since. They don’t know about each other’s involvement but between them have provided an excellent upbringing for Gia who speaks perfect English, having attended American School in Geneva, with enough left over for Carla to live in a fancy house with a maid.

The guys are a disparate bunch. Justin (Peter Lawford) is a philanderer whose wife Lauren (Marian McCargo) dare not let him out of her sight. Phil (Phil Silvers) has a brood and hardly escapes emotional Shirley (Shelley Winters) without one – or all – being attached. The loudmouth exuberant Walter (Telly Savalas) has to bite his tongue when wife Fritzie (Lee Grant) constantly reminds him she hasn’t provided her with a child, when, secretly, he believes she’s the infertile one and Gia the proof.

Initially, this goes the way you expect – and then it doesn’t, confounding all audience expectations. Carla, who had planned to skip town until the celebrations are over, is forced by other circumstances to remain. She’s involved in two subplots – Gia is planning to run off with an older married man to Brazil, and Gina can’t resist the opportunity to get one over on the sniffy local Contessa (Giovanna Galletti). Actually, there’s three subplots if you include Gina trying to keep hold of handsome lover Vittorio (Phillipe Leroy), who initially fears one of the returning soldiers will sweep Carla off her feet and whisk her off to the States, but then becomes very dismissive of her taste in men.

When the secret is revealed, rather than turning on their deceitful husbands, the women are full of praise for them. But that’s only because it’s not the whole secret. They think they discover that out of the goodness of their hearts the men have been sending cash to Carla in memory of their (fictitious) colleague Eddie Campbell who died in the war. The guys, meanwhile, turn against Carla when they become aware of each other’s existence and the fact that not so much just that they have been rooked, collectively, out of $200,000 but that they have individually been helping to bring up what could be another man’s child. Gia, too, on learning of the deceit, is furious and runs away, leaving Carla distraught.

When the true secret emerges, naturally there’s one almighty bust up, with wives and husband and daughter all railing against Carla until Vittorio steps in and explains just what a wonderful mother she has been. This neatly steps over the timebomb, just what possessed Carla to have sex with three men in ten days beyond that they pumped up her ego and brought her food and treats.

There are some brilliant scenes – the streetwalker, the hospital, the car horn that doesn’t work, the missing laundry, the mean Contessa finding a clever way to put down Carla – but mostly it’s held together with the stiffest of glues by an inspired performance by Gina Lollobrigida. Telly Savalas (The Assassination Bureau, 1969) is the pick of the others, playing against type.

Class act from Melvin Frank.

The Leopard (1963) *****

Masterpiece. No other word for the way director Luchino Visconti commands his material with fluid camera and three terrific performances (four, if you count the wily priest). An epic in the old-fashioned sense, combining intelligence, action and romance, though all three underlaid by national or domestic politics. And if you’re going to show crumbling authority you can’t get a better conduit than Burt Lancaster (check out The Swimmer, 1969, for another version of this), physical prowess still to the fore but something missing in the eyes. And all this on sumptuous widescreen.

Only a director of Visconti’s caliber can set the entire tone of the film through what doesn’t happen. We open with a religious service, not a full-scale Mass but recitations of the Rosary, for which the family is gathered in the massive villa of Prince Don Fabrizio Salina (Burt Lancaster). There is an almighty disturbance outside. But nobody dare leave or even react, children silently chided for being distracted, because all eyes are on the Prince and he has not batted an eyelid, worship more important than domestic matters.

Turns out there’s a dead soldier in the garden, indication of trouble brewing. Italy has been beset with trouble brewing from time immemorial so the Prince isn’t particularly perturbed, even if the worst comes to the worst an accommodation is always reached between the wannabes and the wealthy ruling elite.

There’s a fair bit of political sparring throughout but this is handled with such intelligence it’s involving rather than off-putting. Rebel Garibaldi is on the march, it’s the 1860s and revolution is on the way. But it’s not like the French Revolution with aristocrats executed in their thousands and when Garibaldi’s General (Guiliano Gemma) comes calling he addresses the Prince as “Excellency.”

The Prince is a bit of a hypocrite, not as devout as he’d like everyone to believe. He’s got a mistress stashed away for one thing and for another he blames his wife for the need to satisfy his urges elsewhere, complaining that she’s “the sinner” and that despite him fathering seven children with her he’s never seen her navel. Furthermore, the person he makes this argument to is the priest Fr Pirrone (Romolo Valli), who, knowing which side his bread is buttered on, doesn’t offer much of a challenge.

If you’re not going down the more perilous route of taking up arms, advancement in this society is still best achieved through marriage and the Prince’s ambitious nephew Don Tanacredi (Alain Delon), more politically astute, does this through marriage to Angelica (Claudia Cardinale), daughter of Don Calogeo Sedara (Paolo Stoppa).

Brutality and elegance sit side by side. You’re not going to forget the mob of women hunting down and hanging a Government police spy nor, equally, the astonishing ball that virtually concludes proceedings, showing that, whatever changes in society take place, those with money and privilege will still hold their own. But that’s only if they do a little bit of bending the knee to the new powers-that-be, something that Tancredi, by now a rebel hero wounded in battle, is more than happy to do, since that procures him even further advancement, but a step too far for the Prince, who at the end retreats into his study, as if this will provide sanctuary from the impending future.

Don’t expect battle on the scale of Lawrence of Arabia (1962), this action is a more scrappy affair, undisciplined red-shirted hordes sweeping through a town and eventually overwhelming cavalry and ranks of infantry.

But if you’re aiming to hold an audience for three hours, a decent script, romantic entanglement and camerawork isn’t enough. You need the actors to step up. Luckily, they do, in spades. Burt Lancaster is easily the pick, towering head and shoulders, and not just in physicality, above the rest, a man who sees his absolute authority draining away in front of his eyes. Alain Delon (Once a Thief, 1965) comes pretty close, though, not afraid to challenge his uncle’s beliefs nor point out his hypocrisy, and adept at picking his way through the new emerging society, his potential ascension to newfound power demonstrated by wearing a war wound bandage wrapped piratically around one eye, as though keeping a foot in both camps. Though American audiences never quite warmed to Delon, he was catnip for the arthouse brigade, courtesy of being anointed by Visconti and Antonioni in, respectively, Rocco and His Brothers (1960) and L’Eclisse (1962).

Far more than U.S. cinemagoers could imagine, Claudia Cardinale (The Professionals, 1966) also easily straddled commercial and arthouse – Rocco and His Brothers, Fellini’s 8½ (1963) – and on her luminous performance here you can see why. You might also spot future Italian stars Terence Hill (My Name Is Nobody, 1970) and Giuliano Gemma (Day of Anger, 1967). Adapted from the bestseller by Giuseppe Tomasi de Lampedusa by the director and his Rocco and his Brothers team of future director Pasquale Festa Campanile (The Libertine, 1968), Suso Cecchi D’Amico, Enrico Medioli and Massimo Franciosa.

I can’t quite get my head round the audacity of Netflix in attempting a mini-series remake. I’m assuming they’ve had the sense to buy up the rights to the Visconti to prevent anyone comparing the two.

One of the decade’s greatest cinematic achievements.

Jessica (1962) ***

Roman Holiday (1953), Three Coins in a Fountain (1956) and Boy on a Dolphin (1956) had set a high bar for Hollywood romances set in Italy. Since Jean Negulesco had directed the last two, he was expected to sprinkle box office magic on this slight tale of young American midwife Jessica Brown Visconti (Angie Dickinson) adrift in a rustic village in Sicily.

She’s the kind of beauty who’s going to raise male temperatures except Jessica, having been widowed on her wedding day, is not romantically inclined. Unfortunately, that doesn’t stop the entire male population becoming so entranced that their wives become so enraged that led by Maria (Agnes Moorehead) they embark on a sex strike, assuming that without any pregnancies (contraception being frowned upon in a Catholic domain) to deal with Jessica will become redundant and go away. And that so annoys Jessica, who is doing a good job as a midwife, that she turns on the flirting to get back at her female tormentors. Luckily, there’s a reclusive landowner (Gabriele Ferzetti) who happens to be a widower, although romance takes a while to stir. There’s also a priest (Maurice Chevalier), in part acting as narrator, who turns to song every now and then.

So it’s a surprise that this unlikely concoction works at all. It’s charming in the obvious ways, the lush scenery, a traditional wedding, gentle comedy. But it’s a decade too late in taking an innocent view of sex. There’s no crudeness, of course; it doesn’t fall victim to the 1960s need to sexualize in an obvious manner. And not every husband is continuously ogling Jessica so Nunzia (Sylva Koscina) and young bride Nicolina (Danielle De Metz) are in the awkward situation of potentially betraying the sisterhood.

But in resolving the central issue the story develops too many subplots and introduces too many characters, often leaving Jessica rather redundant in terms of the plot, with not much to do, especially when her prospective suitor is absent for a long period going fishing.

Angie Dickinson is delightful as the Vespa-riding innocent turned mischievous. However, in some way though this seemed a backward step for Dickinson, a rising star in the Lana Turner/Elizabeth Taylor mold after being John Wayne’s squeeze in Rio Bravo (1959) and Frank Sinatra’s estranged wife in Ocean’s Eleven (1960) and after a meaty supporting role in A Fever in the Blood (1961) elevated to top billing in The Sins of Rachel Cade (1961). It seemed like Hollywood could not make up its mind whether it wanted her to be like Gidget or be given free rein to express her sexuality.

A charmer like Maurice Chevalier (A Breath of Scandal, 1960) was ideal for what was in effect a whimsical part. The singing probably met audience expectation. Perhaps like Sean Connery’s perennial Scottish accent, nobody ever asked Chevalier to drop his pronounced French accent even to play an Italian. But the picture is whimsical enough without him.

There’s a surprisingly strong supporting cast in four-time Oscar nominee Agnes Moorehead (Pollyanna, 1960), Gabriele Ferzetti (Once Upon a Time in the West, 1969) and French actor (and sometime writer-director) Noel-Noel. Yugoslavian Sylva Koscina (Deadlier Than the Male, 1967), Frenchwoman Kerima (Outcast of the Islands, 1951) and Danielle De Metz (The Scorpio Letters, 1967) all make a splash. Screenplay by Edith Sommer (This Property Is Condemned, 1966) from the bestseller by Flora Sandstrom.

Terrific turn from Angie Dickinson.

The Roman Spring of Mrs Stone (1961) **

Dreary miscalculation. Ever since Tennessee Williams hit a home run with Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), studios, directors and stars had clamored for his works, so much so that Hollywood had greenlit seven adaptations in five years. While box office was one consideration, the playwright was catnip to the Oscar, racking up 17 nominations with a hefty number in the Best Actress category.

However you dressed it up, his work contained a substantial number of portraits of sadness and malevolence and often teetered on the murky, so making them work at all depended not just on the acting and direction, but the initial story. Rather than being based on a play, this was sourced from his first novel, a bestseller.

But the tale never shifts out of first gear and it’s difficult to summon up sympathy never mind interest in any of the characters. The middle-aged romance had proved a cumbersome fix for studios, and since May-December numbers featuring ageing male and younger female had proved popular, Cary Grant set up with an endless supply of woman nearly half his age, it seemed only fair to give middle-aged actresses the opportunity to romance younger men.

Usually, however, this followed a more straightforward path, involving genuine feelings on both sides. But Hollywood was also digging into another cesspit, the female sex worker, somewhat dressed up in Butterfield 8 (1960) and Go Naked in the World (1961), treated more straightforwardly in Never on Sunday (1960) and Girl of the Night. So it only seemed fair to introduce the gigolo.

Stage actress Karen Stone (Vivien Leigh) heads for Rome with her wealthy husband to recover from the failure of her latest play, a Shakespearian outing. When her husband dies on the plane, Karen decides to hang on in the Italian capital, which, after a year, brings her into the orbit of gigolo Paulo (Warren Beatty) and his unscrupulous mentor/manager Contessa Magda (Lotte Lenya). While Karen isn’t entirely a dupe and quickly sees through Paulo, nonetheless a year of loneliness has taken its toll.

Plus she understands the attraction of the older lover, her husband being a good two decades older and willing to subsidize her theatrical and cinematic ambitions. Despite not falling for Paulo’s more obvious con tricks, Karen finds herself enmeshed in a one-sided romance, ignoring the warnings of friend Meg (Coral Brown) on the dangers of becoming the talk of the town with her lover clearly more attracted to rising movie star Barbara (Jill St John). Paulo quickly dumps the Contessa, leaving her free to pour bile into Karen’s ear.

Inevitably, the younger lover tires of the older, but generally such pairings work well enough because initially at least there is attraction on both sides. But when it’s as lop-sided as this no amount of long drawn-out close-ups of the disenchanted provide sufficient compensation for a story that overstays its welcome.

While there are hints of the decadence of La Dolce Vita (1960) that Fellini explored, here it’s more of a surface examination until the surprising ending, where you would think Karen is doing little more than willingly opening the door to a potential serial killer.

The only redeeming element, which might reverberate more easily today, is of the woman demonstrating her independence by being the one to choose, and to some extent discard, the man. While not for most of the movie a sexual predator, she may well have turned into one at the end.

Oscar-winner Vivien Leigh, in her first movie in six years, essays her role well but is compromised by portraying a character that fails to elicit sympathy. Warren Beatty (Promise Her Anything, 1966) avoids the trap of thickening his Italian accent and going wild with the gestures which lends his character more of a thoughtful personality but there’s not much here to write home about. Lotte Lenya (From Russia with Love, 1963) steals the show and was rewarded with an Oscar nomination. Jill St John (Tender Is the Night, 1962) plays the ingénue like an ingénue.

Unless you’re a student of theater I doubt if you’ll have come across Panamian director Jose Quintero. This was his only movie and he was more famous for staging some of Williams’ plays and for resurrecting Eugene O’Neill on Broadway. His inexperience shows in lingering on faces at the expense of creating drama. Gavin Lambert (Inside Daisy Clover, 1965) adapted the novel.

Disappointment.

The Devil’s Brigade (1968) ***

I couldn’t get my head around the idea of the U.S. Army recruiting a bunch of undisciplined misfits, many with jail time, in order to link them up with a crack Canadian outfit. Turns out this part of the film was fictional, the Americans in reality responding to advertisements at Army posts which prioritized men previously employed as forest rangers, game wardens, lumberjacks and the like which made sense since the original mission was mountainous Norway. I should also point out the red beret the soldiers wear is also fictional and while depicted on the poster sporting a moustache commanding officer Lt. Col. Frederick (William Holden) is minus facial hair in the film.

But, basically, it follows a similar formula to The Dirty Dozen (1967), training and internal conflict followed by a dangerous mission. The conflict comes from a clash of cultures between spit-and-polish Canucks and disorderly/juvenile Yanks though, as with the Robert Aldrich epic, the leader taking some of the brunt of the discontent. Collapsible bunk beds, snakes under the sheets and a tendency to fisticuffs are the extent of the antipathy between the units, which is all resolved, as with The Dirty Dozen, when they have to take on people they jointly hate, in this case local bar-room brawlers in Utah.

The movie picks up once they are sent to Italy. Initially employed on reconnaissance, Frederick challenges Major-General Hunter (Carroll O’Connor), who prefers to do things by the book, and in a maverick move sets out to take an Italian position by trekking two miles up a riverbed, creeping into town by stealth and capturing the location without firing a shot.

Next up is the impregnable Monte la Difensa. Taking a leaf out of the Lawrence of Arabia playbook, in a brilliant tactical move, the Americans attack the mountainous stronghold from the rear by way of a mile-high cliff. But that’s the easy part. The rest is trench-by-trench, pillbox-by-pillbox, brutal hand-to-hand fighting.

The battle scenes are excellent and the training section would be perfectly acceptable except for the example of The Dirty Dozen which set a high bar. That said, there is enough going on with the various shenanigans to keep up the interest, but we don’t get to know the characters as intimately as in The Dirty Dozen and there is certainly nobody to match the likes of Telly Savalas, Charles Bronson, Jim Brown and John Cassavetes. That also said, the men do bond sufficiently for some emotional moments during the final battle

At this point William Holden’s career was in disarray, just one leading role (Alvarez Kelly, 1966) and a cameo (Casino Royale, 1967) in four years, and although his screen persona was more charming maverick than disciplined leader he carries off the role well, especially solid when confronting superiors, exhibiting the world-weariness that would a year later in The Wild Bunch put him back on top. Ironically, Cliff Robertson was coming to a peak and would follow his role as the strict disciplinarian Major Crown, the Canadian chief, with an Oscar-winning turn as Charly (1968). Vince Edwards (Hammerhead, 1968) as cigar-chomping hustler Major Bricker makes an ill-advised attempt to steal scenes.

This was the kind of film where the supporting cast were jockeying for a breakout role that would rocket them up the Hollywood food chain – as it did with The Dirty Dozen. Jack Watson (Tobruk, 1967) is the pick among the supporting cast, but he has plenty of competition from Richard Jaeckel (The Dirty Dozen), Claude Akins (Waterhole 3, 1967), Jeremy Slate (The Born Losers, 1967), Andrew Prine (Texas Across the River, 1966), Tom Stern (Angels from Hell, 1968) and Luke Askew (Cool Hand Luke, 1967). Veterans in tow include Dana Andrews (The Satan Bug, 1965) and Michael Rennie (Hotel, 1966).

William Roberts (The Magnificent Seven, 1960) adapted the bestselling book by Robert H. Ableman and George Walton. Director Andrew V. McLaglen (Shenandoah, 1965) was more at home with the western and although there are some fine sequences and the battle scenes are well done this lacks the instinctive touch of some of his other films.

Dirty Dozen-lite.

Light in the Piazza (1962) ****

Will resonate more strongly today. Never intended as a light-hearted confection, despite the obvious premise of young love catching fire in Italy, this was a bold picture in its day and a more subtle examination of the wider impact of mental illness than those later movies set in institutions such as Lilith (1962) or Shock Treatment (1964). Bold, too, of Olivia de Havilland to take on a role that is so transparently maternal. Instead of her middle-aged character succumbing to romantic opportunity as the billing might suggest, to a holiday affair with a rich handsome Italian, she is first and foremost a mother.

Initially, standard romance meet-cute as young Italian Fabrizio (an unlikely George Hamilton) catches the runaway hat of young blonde Clara (Yvette Mimieux) in a piazza in Florence. His ardent pursuit is thwarted at every turn by Clara’s mother Meg (Olivia de Havilland). At first this appears to be for the most obvious of reasons. Who wants their naïve daughter to be swept away by a passionate Italian with heartbreak and possibly worse consequence (what mother does not immediately conjure up pregnancy?) to come.

Sure, Clara seems flighty and a tad over-exuberant and perhaps prone to tantrums but then back in the day this was possibly just an expression of entitlement by rich indulged young women. Turns out there’s a more worrying cause of her sometimes-infantile behavior. She was kicked in the head by a pony and has the mental age of a child of ten. If she is not protected, she might end up as prey to any charming young man.

Clara needs tucked up in bed with a stuffed toy, and her mother to check the room for ghosts and read her a bedtime story before she can go to sleep. Even when Fabrizio’s credentials check out – his father Signor Naccarelli (Rossano Brazzi) vouches for his good intentions, but, in the way of the passionate Italians, would not want to stand in the path of true love.

Clara’s father Noel (Barry Sullivan) is the one who spells out the reality. That pony didn’t just kick his daughter in the head it “kicked the life out of” his marriage. His wife lives in a dreamland, hoping for a miracle, and if that is not forthcoming quite happy to live with a daughter who never grows up. He wants to send her to “a school,” convincing himself it’s “more like a country club.”

Meg fights her own feelings that she knows better than her daughter and that love will not provide the cure, at the same time as batting away the affections of the elder Naccarelli. When she finally gives in to her daughter’s desire, wedding plans fall apart at the last minute when Naccarelli Snr discovers that his 20-year-old son is marrying not, as he imagined, a woman of roughly the same age or slightly younger, but actually someone six years older. Eventually, the wedding goes ahead. Meg convinces herself she did the right thing in permitting the marriage to go ahead.

But this is one of those happy ever afters that don’t quite wash and you might find yourself wondering exactly how it played out when the husband discovered exactly what kind of wife she had. Her instability isn’t genetic so no danger of a subsequent child encountering the same issue. And having to care for someone other than herself might well bring out the same level of maternity as her mother shows, but equally clearly Fabrizio is unaware of exactly what he’s taking on. How will he feel when asked to read her a bedtime story or scour the cupboards for imaginary monsters.

The movie didn’t do well enough to warrant a sequel – audiences expecting romantic confection were disappointed – and just hope Clara didn’t turn into the kind of inmate seen in Lilith and Shock Treatment.

Still, takes a very realistic approach to the problems of someone with such problems maturing into adulthood.

The Oscar-garlanded Olivia de Havilland (two times winner, three times nominee), in her first picture in three years, clearly didn’t want to see out her maturity in those May-December roles that others of her age fell prey to. She is excellent here, no attempt to dress herself up as a sex bomb, and refreshing to see her approach. Yvette Mimieux (Diamond Head, 1962) is excellent as the confused youngster. George Hamilton (The Power, 1968) lets the side down with his speaka-da-Italian Italian but Rossano Brazzi (The Battle of the Villa Fiorita, 1965), who is Italian, has no trouble with the lingo or with being a smooth seducer.

Director Guy Green (Diamond Head, 1962) adds in some unusual Florentine tourist color, but doesn’t shirk the difficult storyline. Julius J. Epstein (Casablanca, 1942) wrote the script.

Worth a look

The Whip and the Flesh / The Whip and the Body (1963) ****

Has there ever been actress so skilled at displaying fear as Daliah Lavi? Where the female stars of horror movies too quickly succumbed to the scream and goggle eyes, Lavi could run a whole gamut of terror without uttering a sound and continue doing so for virtually an entire picture. Top-billed ahead of the reigning king of British horror Christopher Lee, this is another acting tour de force, not quite sustaining the intensity of The Demon (1963) but at times not far off it.

Italian director Mario Bava (Black Sabbath, 1963), here masquerading as John M. Old, has stitched together a mixture of horror, and an early form of giallo, the picture taking place in the classic old dark house, in this case a castle perched on a rock above the sea, the deaths grisly, and almost fits into the “locked room” subgenre of the detective story, where the murders appear impossible to carry out.

The disgraced Kurt Menliff (Christopher Lee) returns to his ancestral home, begging forgiveness from his father Count Vladimir (Gustavo De Nardo) and hoping to reclaim his inheritance and his betrothed Nevenka (Daliah Lavi). While his father exonerates him, Kurt is denied the rest, Nevenka already committed to marriage to his brother Christian (Tony Kendall). Other tensions are soon evident: the housekeeper Giorgia wants revenge on Kurt for the death of her daughter and Christian is in love with another, Katia (Evelyn Stewart).

Nevenka who outwardly protests how much she hates Kurt quickly reveals masochistic tendencies as she gives in to a whipping. But Kurt’s sudden inexplicable murder instigates an investigation, suspicion falling firstly on the father, then Christian and finally Giorgia.

But Nevenka is convinced Kurt is not dead, although his body has been entombed in the castle crypt. Torment creeps into her face at his funeral and we can almost see her grow gaunt in front of our eyes. In a brilliant scene where she tracks what she imagines to be the sound of a whip it turns out to be a branch lashing a window in a storm. Some of her supposed visions are easily explained, muddy footsteps leading from Kurt’s tomb actually belonging to the limping manservant Losat (Luciano Pigozzi). But how do you account for the hand, in an almost 3D shape, reaching out to her in the darkness? Or her ecstasy in still being whipped, her nightdress stripped from her back?

Although sometimes relying too heavily on atmospherics – windows swinging open at night, storm outside – Bava brilliantly marshals the real and the imagined, until the investigation into murder involves all the characters. Once the film begins, the drawbridge in a sense comes down, and nobody else enters the castle, and so we move from one character to another, each with their own motive for possibly committing dire deed. And with each passing moment we return to the demented Nevenka, who wishes Kurt dead but cannot live without him, and, craving the whip, cannot escape his sadistic power. Her faith in Kurt’s resurrection is so intense that the others are soon seeking signs that the dead man is still alive.

This is a horror superior to Hammer. Using the same leading man, the British studio generally expected Lee to be over-the-top, his innate malevolence generally very obvious from the start. Here, he is at his most handsome and although definitely sadistic, the emphasis is less on his pleasure than that of his victim. And while Bava resorts to a similar kind of set, this castle is remote, has no relationship with villagers, and exudes regal dominance rather than just the normal fear of a Dracula picture. Bava employs a more subtle color palette and the piano theme tune by Carlo Rusticelli has a romantic tone.

But for all Bava’s proven skill, this would not be the same without Lavi. I doubt if there is a single actress in the horror domain throughout the 1960s who could match the actress for portraying fright, as she marches up the scale from mere anxiety to full-blown terror. And although women in Dracula movies succumbed to vampire teeth with more than a frisson of sexuality, there is a different deeper sensuality at work here, in what must rank as one of the greatest-ever portrayals of masochism embedded in love.

As noted previously, Lavi, in stepping onto the bigger Hollywood canvas of Lord Jim (1965) and The Silencers (1966), lost the intensity she displayed here and never came close to matching this performance or that of The Demon. Christopher Lee, although claiming to dislike his experience, continued to rule the horror world until he was afforded a wider audience through James Bond, Star Wars, J.R.R. Tolkien and Tim Burton.

Tony Kendall, making his debut, soon graduated to the Kommissar X series, spaghetti westerns (he played Django twice), horror (Return of the Evil Dead, 1973), and thrillers such as Machine Gun McCain (1969). Evelyn Stewart went down much the same route, her long career sprinkled with gems like Django Shoots First (1966), The Sweet Body of Deborah (1968) and The Psychic (1977).

Mario Bava continued to exploit the horror vein including Blood and Black Lace (1964), Planet of the Vampires (1965) and Lisa and the Devil (1973) with Telly Savalas and Elke Sommer.