This wonderful film is good because it manages to observe two important aspects of quality documentary film dedicated to a selected creative person - to analyze the heritage and introduce the person outside his work. As is clear from the title, the story tells about the most talented and unique director Mario Bava. In a small hour timekeeping fits a number of informative interviews from colleagues, relatives or just connoisseurs of the work of the Italian master. With their authoritative help, you will be able to hear important correct observations proving the great gift of Mario Bava, who came to the world of cinema from a young age, where he will soon become a real artist, whose works with a lot of innovative ideas will begin to be adopted by many other directors whose names are known everywhere.
Bava was often the first. This is his gift and curse, because over time, alas, the founders are forgotten, the key offspring of which are eclipsed by quoting colleagues-heirs. In order not to go far, you should take the genre itself. Italy is a country full of bright beauty under the hot sun, which has just experienced a terrible fascist regime. Family traditions and religion are strong in it, by the way, which was an integral part of the spiritual world of the future maestro of action films, from where he drew internal forces that allowed him to remain in the memory of contemporaries a deeply moral friendly person who does not even like to raise his voice. It was on such a difficult soil that Bava sprouted Italian horror, which very quickly became a model of quality and genre finds for several decades. He not only popularized the genre in his homeland, but completely immersed himself in it, exploring the facets, shades and untouched combinations, demonstrating the ability to put no worse Gothic masterpiece than it did gaining respect English studio Hammer. We are talking about the painting “The Mask of Satan” (“La maschera del demonio”), which is imitated and quoted by many, even the recognized storyteller of Gothic tapes Tim Burton openly declares this, paying a huge tribute to the Italian maestro. But not a single gloomy Gothic famous Bava, because he extremely finely deduced the proportions of the combination of a strong suspense, visually bold horror, beckoning mystery, elegant erotica, which could look equally harmoniously in costumed historical and modern stories, united by an action-packed principle.
The knowledgeable viewer must anticipate in advance the segment of the documentary devoted to the Jallo. Again, Bava was first. It was he who guessed and skillfully transferred popular book detectives with yellow cover murders to celluloid film, setting clear rules for the future. The formula of the “yellow” detective established an impressive niche in the successful section of cinema, which was quickly filled by followers, including Dario Argento. Of course, Visconti Violence is an incredibly gifted director, but again for its greatness, they often lose a discoverer who, much earlier than a commendable student, successfully experimented with the same bright colors on the screen used in especially terrible scenes, producing a contrasting effect of perceiving different colors. Watch “Black Saturday, or the Three Faces of Fear” (“I tre volti della paura”) and you will see how the director masterfully played with a kaleidoscope of colors, whipping up fear long before Argento, by the way, in many interviews, calling Bava’s teacher. And should we focus on the roots of the slasher, if the slasher was created by an Italian author whose paintings simply did not reach the American public for marketing reasons, and therefore they could only be seen by a limited number of people, including John Carpenter and Sean Cunningham, who confirmed the long-known fact to the viewer that the slasher is a lightened version of “yellow” thrillers, and “Blood Bay” (“Reazione a catena”) – the progenitor of all youth “meater”, that will find themselves in the States eight years later? . .
In fact, it was the inability to work in America and personal reluctance to leave his homeland that prevented Mario Bava from gaining deserved world attention during his lifetime, so that Ridley Scott did not quote him in his cult blockbuster about Alien, borrowing much from the penny but resourceful “Planet of Vampires” (“Terrore nello spazio”), and he himself would get the opportunity to create with decent funding. However, in any case, the director has always been able to replace a lot of talent, flair of the artist, a desire to expand the genre palette and creative innovation, which is what this documentary project tells about, where in addition to a curious analysis, you can learn Mario Bava outside the status of the maestro of horror, as an incredibly funny person, because clearly presented photos from the shooting, where there is no serious, very accurately demonstrate the cheerful nature of the director.
10 out of 10