Italian cinema in the 1960s had a truly unforgettable moment, during which every type of film was being shot in the studios of Cinecittà , and producers (and like them directors and other technical professionals) demonstrated remarkable skill in the art of making do. That is why Rome and its surroundings became fantastic locations for cinematographers, where they could shoot films set in any type of environment: the Wild West, ancient Rome, the desert, Asia Minor, Africa. Locations such as Tor Caldara, Manziana, Canale Monterano, Mount Soratte, the Monte Gelato waterfalls appear in a truly impressive number of films, in the same way that Monument Valley, that boundless plain in Utah where the mountains were burnished by the wind into the shape of a panettone, became an iconic landscape in great American films. This documentary tells the story of these locations, seeking to gather eyewitness accounts from people who worked there, to compare the different ways the same environment was used. And first and foremost, to examine how low-cost cinema was produced over the decade that made Italian cinema a world leader, acknowledging the creativity and policies of low-cost filmmaking in genre cinema.
DIRECTOR: Alberto Crespi, Steve Della Casa
NATION: Italy
YEAR: 2023
RUNTIME: 58′
Original version with subtitles