Country: Italy
Year: 1926
Duration: 90' muto
Maciste, the hero of one of the most famous series in Italian silent cinema, has to now confront not only villains, but also circus lions. Sarah, the circus rider, and the evil Strasser try to take over the Pommer Circus, trapping Giorgio, the owner’s son, but Maciste is watching over morality and the status quo: in a crescendo of exotic adventures, erotic tension and spectacular numbers, the villains are defeated and Giorgio finds his true love in the Creole Seida. Guido Brignone, prolific author with a distinct popular vocation who adapted himself well to the advent of sound, conveys his ability as an action film director with Maciste’s heroic endeavors. The restoration was carried out on two colored nitrate positives that were found at the Fundação Cinemateca Brasileira in San Paolo and are currently stored in Bologna. The Italian subtitles were recreated thanks to the production documents kept in Turin. The copy was restored by the Museo Nazionale del Cinema and by Cineteca del Comune in Bologna along with Laboratorio L’immagine Ritrovata in Bologna.
Biography
film director
Guido Brignone
(Milan, 1886 - Rome, 1959) moved to Rome in 1914, where he started working first as an actor; in 1916 he made his debut as director with Odette. In the 1920s he directed some films with Bartolomeo Pagano, Maciste the friendly giant. In 1927 he moved first to France and then to Germany. After returning to Italy, in 1934 he became the first Italian director to win the Mostra di Venezia in the category for Best Italian Film with the movie Teresa Confalonieri. He died the day his last film, Nel segno di Roma (1959),
opened in theatres.
FILMOGRAFIA
filmografia essenziale/
essential filmography
Odette (1916), Il cuore dell’altra (1917), La contessa miseria (1918), La vendetta del sole (1919), Il ventriloquo (1920), Fiamma nera (1921), I due sergenti (1922), Maciste e il nipote d’America (1923), Maciste imperatore (1924), Maciste all’inferno (1925), Maciste nella gabbia dei leoni (1926), Il gigante delle Dolomiti (1927), Hingabe (1929), Rubacuori (1931), Pergolesi (1932), Teresa Confalonieri (1934), L’antenato (1936), Vivere (1937), Torna, caro ideal! (1939), Kean (1940), Mamma (1941),
Vertigine (1942), Maria Malibran (1943), Lacrime di sangue (1944), Monaca santa (1945), Il barone Carlo Mazza (1948), La sepolta viva (1949), Core ‘ngrato (1951), Inganno (1952), Bufere (1953), Papà pacifico (1954), Quando tramonta il sole (1955), Le schiave di Cartagine (1956), Nel segno di Roma (1959).
Cast
& Credits
regia, soggetto, sceneggiatura/director, story, screenplay Guido Brignone
fotografia/director of photography Massimo Terzano, Anchise Brizzi
scenografia/set design Giulio Lombardozzi
interpreti e personaggi/cast and characters Bartolomeo Pagano (Maciste), Elena Sangro (Sarah, la cavallerizza/horse rider), Franz Sala (Strasser), Mimy Dovia (Seida), Umberto Guerracino (Sullivan), Vittorio Bianchi (Karl Pommer), Alberto Collo (Giorgio Pommer), Giuseppe Brignone (il vecchio clown/old clown), la troupe del circo Pommer/troupe of Pommer Circus
produttore/producer Stefano Pittaluga
produzione/production Fert-Pittaluga
Sonorizzazione dal vivo dei Marlene Kunz e di Gianni Maroccolo, con la partecipazione di Ivana Gatti