The musicarello is an Italian subgenre which I haven't explored yet. It features young singers in the main roles - like Gianni Morandi, Al Bano, Mal Ryder, Tony Renis, Adriano Celentano, Bobby Solo, Orietta Berti, Little Tony, and more - performing songs from their latest albums. They're inspired by Elvis' Jailhouse Rock and Love Me Tender.
Usually, they tell tender and chaste love stories.
That's why you'd hire Antonio Margheriti (Alien from the Abyss, Cannibal Apocalypse) to direct and write this movie with Italo Fasan (So Sweet, So Dead) and one of the roughest of all Italian creatives, Renato Polselli.
That said, Italian exploitation directors and writers worked on all manner of movies before we knew them as the cult objects that we explore today. Lucio Fulci made the film that started the genre, Ragazzi del Juke-Box as well as a second example of the style, Howlers In the Dock. Bruno Corbucci made Questo pazzo, pazzo mondo della canzone, Ferdinando Baldi directed Rita of the West and even Ruggero Deodato made one, Donne... botte e bersaglieri.
Prince Tancredi (Alberto Lupo) is an abstract artist who falls for an air hostess - "You're so beautiful, you could be an air hostess in the 60s" - named Judy, played by Egyptian-born French but naturalized Italian singer Dalida, who was best remembered for her songs "Bambino," "Le temps des fleurs," "Darla dirladada," "Salama ya salama" and "Paroles, paroles" which had a spoken word part by Alain Delon.
He asks her to pose for him and she accepts. But ah, he's a modern artist and she has some negative on his work. He now questions himself and decides to be sincere and show his passion for her through his art. She decides to leave for a week but promises to see him again while he throws himself into the work. Yet she never comes back. And that's when he learns that she died in a car accident on the day she decided to drive back to tell him that she was in love.
That's how you know that Renato Polselli wrote this.
That said, Dalida had a pretty crazy life herself.
A year before this movie, after having a major hit with the song "El Cordobés" in Latin America, a record dedicated to a bullfighter she'd had an affair with named Manuel Benitez, and also had a hit with "Parlez moi de lui," a song that Cher would re-record in 1972 as "The Wayof Love," the second single on her Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves album. Dalida also started a secret relationship with avant-garde singer-songwriter Luigi Tenco. He wrote the song "Ciao amore, ciao" for their competing song at Sanremo Music Festival and both sang their own version. He was drunk and nervous, she got a standing ovation. They were both eliminated in the first round and when Dalida returned to her hotel, Tenco had killed himself in protest. Or maybe organized crime was invovled. Regardless, the next week, she appeared on TV and dedicated the song to Tenco, wearing the same dress she had on when she found his body. A few weeks later, she tried to kill herself and spent five days in a coma.
When she returned, she was dubbed Saint Dalida by the press. This film was a minor success and has her songs "Dan dan dan," "L'ultimo valzer," "Amo l'amore," and "Pensiamoci ogni sera" performed by her during the story.
Dalida's life is, again, forever sad. Her first husband Lucien Morisse, as well as her closer friend singer Mike Brant and her longest lover Richard Chanfray all killed themselves. In May of 1987, she followed them by overdosing on barbituates, leaving a note that said, "La vie m'est insupportable. Pardonnez-moi." ("Life is unbearable for me. Forgive me.")
She remains an icon in Europe. In 1988, the French newspaper Le Monde placed Dalida as second in personalities who had the greatest impact on French society, behind only Général de Gaulle. And when France selected the "Greatest Singer of the Century" in France, which was based on numbers of album and single sales, number of radio airplays and chart positions, Dalida placed third after Madonna and Céline Dion.
While reading of her made me sad, I'm still intensely fascinated by the fact that movies can bring me through so many paths, learning of people and times and lives that otherwise I would have never experienced.
Usually, they tell tender and chaste love stories.
That's why you'd hire Antonio Margheriti (Alien from the Abyss, Cannibal Apocalypse) to direct and write this movie with Italo Fasan (So Sweet, So Dead) and one of the roughest of all Italian creatives, Renato Polselli.
That said, Italian exploitation directors and writers worked on all manner of movies before we knew them as the cult objects that we explore today. Lucio Fulci made the film that started the genre, Ragazzi del Juke-Box as well as a second example of the style, Howlers In the Dock. Bruno Corbucci made Questo pazzo, pazzo mondo della canzone, Ferdinando Baldi directed Rita of the West and even Ruggero Deodato made one, Donne... botte e bersaglieri.
Prince Tancredi (Alberto Lupo) is an abstract artist who falls for an air hostess - "You're so beautiful, you could be an air hostess in the 60s" - named Judy, played by Egyptian-born French but naturalized Italian singer Dalida, who was best remembered for her songs "Bambino," "Le temps des fleurs," "Darla dirladada," "Salama ya salama" and "Paroles, paroles" which had a spoken word part by Alain Delon.
He asks her to pose for him and she accepts. But ah, he's a modern artist and she has some negative on his work. He now questions himself and decides to be sincere and show his passion for her through his art. She decides to leave for a week but promises to see him again while he throws himself into the work. Yet she never comes back. And that's when he learns that she died in a car accident on the day she decided to drive back to tell him that she was in love.
That's how you know that Renato Polselli wrote this.
That said, Dalida had a pretty crazy life herself.
A year before this movie, after having a major hit with the song "El Cordobés" in Latin America, a record dedicated to a bullfighter she'd had an affair with named Manuel Benitez, and also had a hit with "Parlez moi de lui," a song that Cher would re-record in 1972 as "The Wayof Love," the second single on her Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves album. Dalida also started a secret relationship with avant-garde singer-songwriter Luigi Tenco. He wrote the song "Ciao amore, ciao" for their competing song at Sanremo Music Festival and both sang their own version. He was drunk and nervous, she got a standing ovation. They were both eliminated in the first round and when Dalida returned to her hotel, Tenco had killed himself in protest. Or maybe organized crime was invovled. Regardless, the next week, she appeared on TV and dedicated the song to Tenco, wearing the same dress she had on when she found his body. A few weeks later, she tried to kill herself and spent five days in a coma.
When she returned, she was dubbed Saint Dalida by the press. This film was a minor success and has her songs "Dan dan dan," "L'ultimo valzer," "Amo l'amore," and "Pensiamoci ogni sera" performed by her during the story.
Dalida's life is, again, forever sad. Her first husband Lucien Morisse, as well as her closer friend singer Mike Brant and her longest lover Richard Chanfray all killed themselves. In May of 1987, she followed them by overdosing on barbituates, leaving a note that said, "La vie m'est insupportable. Pardonnez-moi." ("Life is unbearable for me. Forgive me.")
She remains an icon in Europe. In 1988, the French newspaper Le Monde placed Dalida as second in personalities who had the greatest impact on French society, behind only Général de Gaulle. And when France selected the "Greatest Singer of the Century" in France, which was based on numbers of album and single sales, number of radio airplays and chart positions, Dalida placed third after Madonna and Céline Dion.
While reading of her made me sad, I'm still intensely fascinated by the fact that movies can bring me through so many paths, learning of people and times and lives that otherwise I would have never experienced.