Italy

Quote:
This long-lost film by Luigi Bazzoni is something of an oddity for Shameless whose 19 previous releases have comprised gialli and other thrillers or films with copious sex and/or nudity. Footprints is a very moody, atmospheric and tense mystery thriller about a woman, Alice, who wakes up late one Tuesday, finishes a translation and gets to the office in time for the twelve o’clock deadline. There she is asked if she knew when it had to be in and, replying ‘midday’, is asked which day? She is surprised to learn that it is, in fact Thursday, and she has lost two days. Hooked on sedatives and haunted by dreams of a film that may or may not be real, her fragile mental state is completely rocked by this news.Read More »

Synopsis:
A New Orleans housewife leaves her daughter and son home alone to meet her lover. While with him, she receives a call that her son has died. Wreckless driving rushing to her house results in a horrible accident. The lover dies and she is sent to a mental institution to recover from the psychological trauma. Upon her release a year later she moves into the boarding house where they would rendezvous. The landlord has passed away and her blind son is left to maintain the house. With every day that passes, his lust for her grows while she remains true to her lover. The situation comes to a “head” on a weekend visit with her daughter. All secrets will be revealed and no one will be the same. Inspired by actual events.Read More »

Synopsis:
Wily roving gunslinger Sartana arrives in a small town and tries to find a hidden fortune of half a million dollars in gold and two million dollars in counterfeit money. Naturally, a bunch of other treacherous folks who include conniving widow Senora Manassas, shrewd fellow gunslinger Grand Full, and the vicious and unhinged General Monk are also looking to get their greedy hands on said fortune.Read More »

Synopsis:
Yankee, (Philippe Leroy in his first western) is a bounty killer who decides to take on a bandit chief and his henchmen when he realises the prices on all their heads adds up to a tidy sum. The bandit, El Grande Concho (Adolfo Celi), is lord of the entire region and resides like a king at court in an abandoned church surrounded by his entourage of philosopher, painter, fortune teller and soldiers; robbing and murdering anyone who ventures into his territory. Add to this a shipment of gold big enough to make them all rich beyond their dreams and the stage is set for gunplay, intrigue and cruelty as the lone gunman sets his wits and skills against the might of the megalomaniac leader.Read More »

ORG and excess roads to wisdom
Fernando Birri
“The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom,” said William Blake. This was the mantra we attempted to analyze in the non-film ORG. I want to try to make this lecture correspond formally to its subject, an experimental film. This may or may not work, but I want to attempt an experimental lecture as a way into the film.

I chose Memories of Fire by Eduardo Galeano because I think it gets to the heart of our experience. That is, the Americas as a vessel for delirium. This has as much to do with dreams as it has to do with the creative energy that some call poetry.Read More »

A touching story of brothers raised apart and then brought together under tragic circumstances, this drama by Valerio Zurlini remains true to Vasco Pratolini’s novel. Told in a series of flashbacks as Enrico (Marcello Mastroianni) remembers the past, the brothers are separated after their mother dies. Enrico is raised by a humble guardian who works as a butler, his brother Lorenzo (Jacques Perrin) is taken in by a grandmother who gives him all he wants or needs. Enrico grows up to become a hard-working journalist, spending most of his time in Rome. Lorenzo is a young idealist living in Florence with no real need to work. The brothers rarely see each other, but when they finally meet after an extended absence, Lorenzo is gravely ill and dying. (-allmovie.com)Read More »

Synopsis:
In Dublin, a young woman is brutally murdered in her home by a maniac that throws acid in her face and then slits her throat with a razor. Her mangled body is later discovered in the boot of a limousine owned by the Swiss Ambassador Sobiesky. The Ambassador, who was the dead woman’s lover, refuses to cooperate with the police due to his diplomatic immunity. John Norton, an ex-cop famed for his brutal working methods, is brought in to help and gets too deeply involved when he stars an affair with the Ambassador’s beautiful step-daughter, Helen. Meanwhile, the brutal killings continue…Read More »

A female school teacher is implicated in a murder in a Sicilian town only hours after her arrival. The dead man insulted her on the bus on the way into town. As the mystery unfolds, it becomes clear that the town is hiding some very sinister secrets.Read More »

Newly married to an older man, Julie returns to Vienna, where a razor wielding slasher is killing women. Jean, her cruel and sadistic former lover, immediately contacts her, certain that only he can satisfy her strange vice. But she rejects him. She also meets George, the handsome cousin of her friend Carol; both are newly rich, thanks to an uncle’s death. Julie’s husband Neil is away frequently, so George pours on the charm. Meanwhile, it seems that the slasher is now focused on Julie. Bodies pile up, other murders are barely avoided, and George invites her to go away with him. Can it end happily?Read More »