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Released by: Twilight Time
Released on: August 8th, 2014.
Director: Stanley Kramer
Cast: Anthony Quinn, Anna Magnani, Virna Lisi, Hardy Kruger, Sergio Franchi, Giancarlo Gianini
Year: 1969
Purchase From Screen Archives
The Movie:
The message movie director and a side of ham.
Director Stanley Kramer was a master of the blunt force melodrama message movie. Films like THE DEFIANT ONES, GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER, ON THE BEACH and JUDGEMENT AT NUREMBERG didn't exactly traffic in subtlety. Whether dealing with racism, the possibility of nuclear holocaust or Nazi war criminals, Kramer's films tended to draw their themes in broad strokes often laced with melodrama.
Which brings us to THE SECRET OF SANTA VITTORIA.
The wild and wooly tale of a small Italian town with a robust winemaking industry dealing with the fall of Mussolini and the imminent arrival of Nazi overlords near the end of WWII, this film was one of Kramer's few projects with strong comedic elements. Anthony Quinn of ZORBA THE GREEK fame toplines an impressive cast which also includes Anna Magani and Hardy Kruger. Quinn plays town buffoon Bombolini - a boozy but fun local character who spends most of his time either entertaining the town's eccentric residents with his antics or suffering the shrewish nagging of his wife (Magani). When news reached the small hamlet that Mussolini has been ousted, everyone starts prematurely celebrating. But Bombolini knows better. Power abhors a vacuum and the Nazis will soon step in to assert control of their floundering ally Italy. And when they arrive in Bombolini and friends' neighborhood in the form of German officer Sepp Von Prum (Kruger), it is suddenly up to the town eccentric to save them.
The "secret" of the title is of course the huge stash of wine in the town and the central plot drive is about how the town and its kooky residents hide the vino from the greedy German occupiers. This makes for a fair amount of slapstick throughout the film, and in star Quinn, Kramer had an ideal match for this material. Quinn was one of the great stars of Hollywood but he was also a born ham almost genetically incapable of subtlety. Whether climbing a clock tower to frantically erase a pro-Mussolini message despite his deep fear of heights, or just spinning lies to divert probing Nazis, Quinn's Bombolini is always fun to watch. The great Italian actor Giancarlo Giannini is also present as a townsperson who helps Bombolini gin up some courage during the clock tower escapade.
Kramer's vaunted social conscience has a harder time making its presence known in a film like this, but he still gets his licks in. The film is really a love letter to the regular people who keep things running in the face of oppression. The working class is king here - and infinitely more clever than those evil aristocratic Nazis. The noble wounded proletariat soldier trope gets played in the film as well, but it works reasonably enough.
THE SECRET OF SANTA VITTORIA had the misfortune of opening right after EASY RIDER in 1969 and was a bomb at the box office. Audiences were ready for edgier fare, and an old-fashioned romp like this wasn't going to be an easy sell at the dawn of the "new" Hollywood. While GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER had been a massive hit for Kramer just a couple of years earlier, the failure of VITTORIA effectively put an end to the man's big budget career. He stumbled through about another decade of television and smaller budgeted fare.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Twilight Time's 1080p 2.35:1. encoded AVC transfer is another top-notch presentation. Color and detail are in the upper ranges and contrast is strong. Black levels are pure and deep and the outdoor scenes look terrific. This is also a naturalistic presentation with healthy film grain. Image manipulation and digital corrections of any kind are not in evidence.
Sound is delivered via a nicely balanced mono DTS-HD Master Audio track that keeps the dialog clear and centered while providing decent oomph for the robust score. As far as mono tracks go from this era this is one of the stronger ones.
The only real extras are an isolated score in DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. and the film's theatrical trailer. There is also an MGM 90th anniversary promo. Regular Twilight Time scribe Julie Kirgo contributes liner notes to a full color insert booklet that offer up some insight and information about the history of the picture.
The Final Word:
While far from Kramer's best film, THE SECRET OF SANTA VITTORIA is a lot of fun and a must for Anthony Quinn fans. Beautifully shot, and filled with lively performances and scenery it is a film worthy of reappraisal and while short on extras, Twilight Time have delivered where it counts in the A/V departments.
Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!
