Behind the Scenes of Day of the Cobra (1980)

Ex-boxer Enzo G. Castellari blocks a fight scene with Franco Nero.

GREAT WHITE (1980), aka THE LAST SHARK, aka THE LAST JAWS, aka WHITE DEATH, aka L'ULTIMO SQUALO, aka...

With a seemingly unending supply of alternate titles, Enzo G. Castellari crosses the line from homage and into a lawsuit from Universal Studios.

Here he is in on the set in 1980 with a stylish director's chair, a personalized bullhorn, and a clapper that indicates their shooting title was White Death. That's cinematographer Alberto Spagnoli getting sand in his pants behind the camera.

In 2001, I asked Castellari about the trouble he got into with Universal over the U.S. theatrical release. Here was his response:

"The script idea for GREAT WHITE came from Ramón Bravo, a Mexican writer famous for his books with the sea and sharks as themes. In Mexico, many films have been made from his books. He wrote the treatment that was given to the Italian producer, who cunningly had the Italian script written by an Italian screenwriter without buying the rights from Mr. Bravo. When the film came out--only in the Los Angeles area--it made over $2,000,000 at the box office on the opening weekend! It was an extraordinary success, especially for an Italian film. 30...40...50 similar films were made in Italy and without any protests or even acknowledgement from the Americans, because their success was limited. But GREAT WHITE was different. It came out after JAWS 2 (1978) and it was a success, thus motivating lawyers and producers to stop the screening. They succeeded after a month. It's ironic though...if the Italian producer hadn't 'stolen' the idea in the first place, he would have become a multimillionaire! Bravo had written books on sharks even before the original JAWS (1975) came out, and this would have certainly made the difference. Maybe there is a lesson to be learned? A divine intervention?"

And that's probably the only time the phrase "divine intervention" was associated with the film. But I do agree that there are lessons to be learned. The movie has enough humor and silliness that he almost could have argued the case on the grounds that it was a satire of JAWS.

--MW

Behind the Scenes of KEOMA (1977)

Enzo G. Castellari behind the camera for this reverse tracking shot of Franco Nero in the magnificent Spaghetti Western KEOMA. The fearsome Shannon brothers aren't quite so intimidating sitting on boxes.

And here's the view through Castellari's lens.

--MW

UN FLIC - Film Bleu

UN FLIC (aka DIRTY MONEY, 1972)

Directed by Jean-Pierre Melville

Starring Alain Delon, Richard Crenna and Catherine Deneuve

This was Melville’s final film and perhaps the coldest, both visually and emotionally, of all his crime pictures. As with the director’s most well known film, the highly influential LE SAMOURAI (1967), UN FLIC is American film noir as seen through French eyes. Ostensibly a heist film­–with echoes of the director’s earlier and far more accessible BOB LE FLAMBEUR (1955)–UN FLIC spends most of its running time detailing the machinations of a small crew of Parisian thieves led by Richard Crenna. Initially, the film’s title character (Delon) gets only enough screen time to let the viewer see how he’s been broken and demoralized by his mind-numbing job, but gradually the balance shifts and we see that Delon is a sort of zombified doppelganger to Crenna’s untouchable criminal. The mirrored pair share a lover (Deneuve), and the three often converge in a nightclub owned by Crenna’s character, but the cop and the thief barely acknowledge one another and seem more like two sides of the same coin rather than two separate characters. One half expects a Lynchian/Fincheresque finale where the two characters are revealed to be the same person, but following the conventions of film noir, we all know that a bullet will eventually serve the same purpose.

UN FLIC has been photographed almost entirely in shades of blue with occasional, light accents of green. The appearance of any other primary color seems to be more of an accident than an intentional decision. The film’s low budget probably prohibited complete control over the visual palette, but the stark set design and meticulous attention to detail help to create a hermetic environment that is as stark and cold as in any other film I’ve seen. This level of stylization alone makes the film worth looking at, but I did have many reservations about the script.

The picture starts with a brilliantly constructed and flawlessly executed heist scene. Crenna and his accomplices stake out and gradually enter a bank in a remote seaside resort community. It is Christmas Eve and the rain beats down on the men as they make their way one by one into the bank. The entire heist plays out in real time with barely a single word of dialogue uttered and with the crashing waves providing the only musical accompaniment. This sequence is the film’s highpoint and unfortunately everything afterwards comes as something of a disappointment. Delon’s disconnected and detached cop is less interesting than the plight of the thieves and his scenes often feel very far away from the heart of the film, as cold as that heart may be.

More disappointing still is the fact that the thrills of the opening bank robbery sequence never come close to being matched at any point during the rest of the film. Crenna’s gang attempts a daring drug rip-off that involves a helicopter and a speeding train, but this time the real-time action falls flat and quickly becomes tedious. The meager budget apparently didn’t allow for a train or a helicopter, so much of the sequence is depicted using unconvincing miniatures that would barely pass muster in an Antonio Margheriti picture. The ineffectiveness of this scene is compounded by the fact that it never really pays off in any way, and in the end, seems rather arbitrary. Stylistically, it’s simply a carbon copy of the opening sequence and narratively it serves only to bring Delon’s cop a little closer to the action. It’s a bit pointless on both counts.

Michael Mann’s HEAT (1995) uses a very similar structure, with very similar characters, but manages to pull off the story arc with far more success. Mann’s opening heist is exciting and tense, but his central action sequence manages to up the ante and still remain an organic part of the screenplay. By contrast, Melville’s train robbery seems like a clumsily inserted set-piece, and it can’t all be blamed on the toy helicopter. Mann was also able to retain the existential qualities of his characters and still make them sympathetic, or at least identifiable. Melville, who along with Delon made inscrutability a conscious stylistic choice, only offers up “a cop” and “a criminal.” I’d add “a girl,” but Denueve’s character is even less recognizable as human than the others. The only face that we can even begin to see behind belongs to Crenna’s reluctant third man. This approach is fine, but when you’ve already perfected it (with LE SAMOURAI), anything less seems like a disappointment.  Somehow Walter Hill managed to pull off this trick with THE DRIVER (1978), but here Melville is eclipsed by his own shadow.

--MW

On Location, 1990: The Bronx Warriors

Here's a great shot of Enzo G. Castellari directing a scene for 1990: THE BRONX WARRIORS (1982) on location in Brooklyn's East River waterfront.

Here's the scene as it appears in the film:

And here's roughly the same spot as it looks today, via Google View. The wider angle lens doesn't make it a perfect match, but you can see the same Empire Stores brick building in the background on the left. The Empire Stores building was also used for a separate action sequence.

--MW