I’ve just finished reviewing Howard Hughes’ latest book on Italian cinema.
I enjoyed it and it is very reasonably priced I think. Well worth a place on my shelf at any rate.
Seems one for me.
I always liked Hughes, not only when he writes about westerns, also about art in general
Nice review Phil. I have had this book on my radar for quite some time now and you persuaded me to order it.
I’ve been meaning to pick this up recently but have been put off between the price of the HB and PB.
I ordered the PB since the difference in price is astronomical.
PB costs £9.74
HB costs £38.25
Wow…thats a huge difference !
i bought this book from amazon uk for indeed £9.74. a few weeks ago but haven’t even started it yet. will do soon hopefully. i also liked his spaghetti western book.
Very nice and accurate review Phil. I totally agree with your assessment. It is beneficial to the reader if he has seen or is familiar with the films
covered. If you are completely unaware of the films it will be like reading Greek. It is amazing how many of the same character actors we are
all familiar with appeared in all of the films covered. I enjoyed the book very much and agree with his opinions and coverage. For a film that
covers the entire catalog of a country’s films this is it. Howard told me he really enjoyed researching all of the films and it must have been quite
an undertaking. If you’ve read any of Howard’s other books you’ll know what to expect. He doesn’t let the reader down.
For those interested Howard Hughes has top 20 A list, and a top 20 offbeat list of essential Italian films in this book.
The A list:
La dolce vita (Fellini, 1960)
The mask of Satan (Bava, 1960)
Hercules conquers Atlantis (Cottafavi, 1961)
The horrible secret of Dr Hichcock (Freda, 1962)
The Leopard (Visconti, 1963)
Contempt (Godard, 1963)
The gospel according to St Matthew (Pasolini, 1964)
Castle of blood (Margheriti, 1964)
Fists in the pocket (Bellocchio, 1965)
Battle of Algiers (Pontecorvo, 1966)
Blowup (Antonioni, 1966)
The good, the bad and the ugly (Leone, 1966)
The big silence (Corbucci, 1967)
Diabolik (Bava, 1968)
The bird with the crystal plumage (Argento, 1970)
The conformist (Bertolucci, 1970)
Violent city (Sollima, 1970)
The Marseilles connection (Castellari, 1973)
Illustrious corpses (Rosi, 1975)
Suspiria (Argento, 1977)
The offbeat list:
The Trojan war (Ferroni, 1961)
Maciste in hell (Freda, 1962)
Sons of thunder (Tessari, 1962)
Blood and black lace (Bava, 1964)
The castle of the living dead (Kiefer, 1964)
The last man on earth (Salkow/Ragona 1964)
The wild, wild planet (Margheriti, 1966)
Django (Corbucci, 1966)
Special mission lady Chaplin (De Martino, 1966)
Django, kill (Questi, 1967)
Fellini satyricon (Fellini, 1969)
They call me Trinity (Barboni, 1970)
Milan caliber 9 (Di Leo, 1972)
Deep red (Argento, 1975)
Get mean (Baldi, 1976)
Tentacles (Assonitis, 1976)
The inglorious bastards (Castellari, 1977)
Zombie flesh eaters (Fulci, 1979)
Puma man (De Martino, 1980)
The Bronx warriors (Castellari, 1982)
Funny, he still has The Great Silence as a 67 film. For that he is probably the only one.
The films I have seen in the list, I agree with. Many deserve their inclusion in such a list.