There’s quite a difference between the Italian and English titles for this three part sex comedy anthology directed by Sergio Martino.
The Italian, Ricchi, ricchissimi, practicamente in mutande literally translates as rich, richer, practically in (the) underwear, referring to hotter / colder kind of game and thus providing a more apt analogy for the ‘nearly there’ sexual outcomes of the three stories.
They are framed via the device of a day in the life of a court, where the judge presides over the three cases, each presented via flashback narrated by the male accused, incarnated by Pippo Caruso, Lino Banfi and Renato Pozzetto respectively.
In the first he takes his wife and sons to the beach and builds a beach hut but is then understandably threatened and troubled by the presence of a free-living and loving group of French nudists, led by a rather well-endowed man, who have also decide to set up camp there...
In the second he’s a businessman, the owner of a successful sausage factory, who believes he has attracted the attentions of a German contessa, with all manner of farcical antics ensuing as he thus tries to avoid his own family...
In the third he’s another businessman, the owner of an struggling shipbuilders, who sees salvation in the form of persuading an Arab sheik to commission a yacht. Unfortunately the sheikh takes an undue interest in his wife, wanting her to join his harem as the brunette pearl amongst the existing 12 blond ones as part of the deal.
While the second and third episodes also feature Janet Agren and Edwige Fenech respectively, the latter also being paired with her old giallo colleague George Hilton as the Sheikh, fans of the two actresses may be disappointed the lack of actual T&A on display, all of which is concentrated in the first story and of an equal opportunities nature.
If the filmmakers may be accused of playing on stereotypes, particularly in the third episode, this is offset by their fair-minded skewering of various Italian types, whether the judiciary, the bourgeoisie or the proletariat and the various comic reversals and misidentifications that occur as the narratives are resolved.
Here, we might also consider a skit from the contemporaneous British show The Young Ones, representative of a new comedy that purported to reject the racist and sexist values of its predecessor: in an Arab court, the advisor asks the sheikh if he would like to see the foreign ambassador over the subject of their alleged mandatory cruelty. Yes, replies the sheikh. Which bit of him would you like to see? asks the advisor.
Above all, however, is that it is simply funny - and more specifically essentially harmlessly so.
Showing posts with label Janet Agren. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Janet Agren. Show all posts
Tuesday, 24 February 2009
Saturday, 4 October 2008
Bakterion / Panic / I Vivi invidieranno i morti
The most memorable thing about Bakterion / Panic is surely the name of David Warbeck's special agent: Captain Kirk.
Otherwise it's pretty much your standard MIC experiment goes wrong leading to a monster running amok 50s sci-fi stuff, brought up to its 1970s date by the distinctly cynical treatment given the selfsame authorities, who are concerned more for covering their own backs over the location of a bacteriological warfare lab in the middle of a city than the welfare of its citizens.
The putative location is Newtown, England, resulting in some awkward non-integration of stock footage of iconic London buses and location shooting with clearly Spanish locations and extras elsewhere and the concomitant displacement / generalisation of any political point compared to the more specifically grounded likes of The Quatermass Xperiment, Quatermass II and The Crazies.
Admittedly, however, any such point is also decidedly secondary insofar as we're still very much in the realm of individualising conflict, with Kirk the representative of a more benevolent face of authority who takes up the cause of the people of Newport and saves them from themselves, the monster and the excesses of his masters, all whilst finding time to establish the classic heterosexual romantic outcome with Janet Agren's research scientist in that don't-worry-she's-also-a-woman-as-well manner.
The monster
Those scenes which don't feature the good and bad guys emphasise the scientist turned monster stalking and slaying, each being announced by the introduction of two or three stock types who we know are there solely for the purpose of being slaughtered.
There is one exception. This is the priest who saves his choirboys at the cost of his own life, who get an establishing scene before they are attacked – a scene which one suspects must have played differently to Catholic Spanish and Italian audiences than an Anglican one.
Having said all this, it's also worth noting that if the IMDB can be believed the film wasn't released in Italy and Spain until late December 1982 and March 1983 respectively. The possibility of political factors playing a part here are, however, countered by the likelihood that the film sat on the shelf because of its overall poor quality. If so, its belated release might then be speculatively attributed to some combination of the relative prominence of Nightmare City – whose end "the nightmare becomes reality" coda is recalled by the "this could already have happened" one here – Zombie Creeping Flesh and other monster-cum-disaster movies in the early 1980s along with the higher profiles enjoyed by its stars at this time.
With the direction throughout characterised by a perfunctory quality – the one sign of imagination seems more accidental than anything else, as the monster's attack on a crowded cinema sees everything go black in a reductio ad absurdum of the old don't show the monster trope – Panic is a film which strongly suggests the success of the only other Ricci film I can remember seeing, the 1971 giallo Cross Current, was down more to Flavio Mogherini's production design and its impressive ensemble cast.
Don't have nightmares, do sleep well...
With no Mogherini on board, more weight is placed on the performers here. Warbeck and Agren are game, but don't quite seem as comfortable in their roles – or the co-production way of working – as they would given a few more years experience. Franco Ressel, something of a regular in Ricci's films, again proves to the manner born as the sleazy scientist in charge of the biological warfare programme, while Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue's Jose Lifante is very welcome as the Newtown police sergeant out of his depth – even if his presence also reminds one of another, far superior, English set, Italian-Spanish made science gone bad horror movie of the period.
Otherwise it's pretty much your standard MIC experiment goes wrong leading to a monster running amok 50s sci-fi stuff, brought up to its 1970s date by the distinctly cynical treatment given the selfsame authorities, who are concerned more for covering their own backs over the location of a bacteriological warfare lab in the middle of a city than the welfare of its citizens.
The putative location is Newtown, England, resulting in some awkward non-integration of stock footage of iconic London buses and location shooting with clearly Spanish locations and extras elsewhere and the concomitant displacement / generalisation of any political point compared to the more specifically grounded likes of The Quatermass Xperiment, Quatermass II and The Crazies.
Admittedly, however, any such point is also decidedly secondary insofar as we're still very much in the realm of individualising conflict, with Kirk the representative of a more benevolent face of authority who takes up the cause of the people of Newport and saves them from themselves, the monster and the excesses of his masters, all whilst finding time to establish the classic heterosexual romantic outcome with Janet Agren's research scientist in that don't-worry-she's-also-a-woman-as-well manner.
The monster
Those scenes which don't feature the good and bad guys emphasise the scientist turned monster stalking and slaying, each being announced by the introduction of two or three stock types who we know are there solely for the purpose of being slaughtered.
There is one exception. This is the priest who saves his choirboys at the cost of his own life, who get an establishing scene before they are attacked – a scene which one suspects must have played differently to Catholic Spanish and Italian audiences than an Anglican one.
Having said all this, it's also worth noting that if the IMDB can be believed the film wasn't released in Italy and Spain until late December 1982 and March 1983 respectively. The possibility of political factors playing a part here are, however, countered by the likelihood that the film sat on the shelf because of its overall poor quality. If so, its belated release might then be speculatively attributed to some combination of the relative prominence of Nightmare City – whose end "the nightmare becomes reality" coda is recalled by the "this could already have happened" one here – Zombie Creeping Flesh and other monster-cum-disaster movies in the early 1980s along with the higher profiles enjoyed by its stars at this time.
With the direction throughout characterised by a perfunctory quality – the one sign of imagination seems more accidental than anything else, as the monster's attack on a crowded cinema sees everything go black in a reductio ad absurdum of the old don't show the monster trope – Panic is a film which strongly suggests the success of the only other Ricci film I can remember seeing, the 1971 giallo Cross Current, was down more to Flavio Mogherini's production design and its impressive ensemble cast.
Don't have nightmares, do sleep well...
With no Mogherini on board, more weight is placed on the performers here. Warbeck and Agren are game, but don't quite seem as comfortable in their roles – or the co-production way of working – as they would given a few more years experience. Franco Ressel, something of a regular in Ricci's films, again proves to the manner born as the sleazy scientist in charge of the biological warfare programme, while Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue's Jose Lifante is very welcome as the Newtown police sergeant out of his depth – even if his presence also reminds one of another, far superior, English set, Italian-Spanish made science gone bad horror movie of the period.
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