Fifty years of Italian cinema (1955)

18 However, an accurate account of the earliest beginnings of the Italian cinema, the « silent theatre », as it was then called, cannot be reported. No judgment was passed on those first films, now nearly all vanished. One can only rely on memory, and what information survived the years is insufficient for appraisal. The contemporary newspapers and periodicals of that era hardly mentioned them and there was, as yet, no specialized film press. Alberini's next films were II cane riconoscente (The Grateful Dog) and Centauri (Centaurs) , both in 1907. The former won first prize in the first Italian film competition — a gold plaque presented by Lumiere. Another film of this period, Le esercitazioni ippiche degli Ufficiali di Cavalleria di Pinerolo (Horse Drills by Cavalry Officers in the Pinerolo) by Roberto Omegna, was a work of such technical excellence as to suggest the employment of some « secret » mechanical device in its production. With these two works, Italian film production was launched in the foreign markets. The Alberini-Santoni Studios' first « story film » dates from 1905, 77 sacco di Roma (The Sack of Rome), directed by Guazzoni. Its length was not more than a few minutes, but, short as it was, it was replete with « spectacular scenes » climaxed with a charge by the Bersaglieri in the awful wake of which numerous wounded among the dead held their heads and clutched their hearts. The settings can be said to have had a certain charming oleographic fidelity. The camera photographed the scenes at the rate of 12 frames a second, in contrast to the 24 frames a second now employed, so the action on the screen was considerably faster than is the case today, even allowing for the compensations in the speed of the early projection machines. Here we must also recall that the Italian comedian, Leopold Fregoli, « The Transformation Magicians (or « Quick Change Artist »), did a few comic turns when he visited the Lumiere studios in Paris in 1896. Fregoli used to project these little films at the end of his stage performances : Fregoli al caffe (Fregoli at the Cafe), Fregoli al ristorante (Fregoli at the Restaurant), Una burla di Fregoli, (Fregoli's Joke), II sogno di Fregoli (Fregoli's Dream), and finally Fregoli dietro le quinte (Fregoli Behind the Scenes), which revealed the magician's baffling secrets to an astonished world. Fregoli called these cinema tid-bits « Fregoligraphs ». Not content with the success he enjoyed with these films, he also wanted to make sound and talking films 25 years before the sound film came into actual being. As he himself played many of the characters in these brief farces, satirical comedies and « musical extravaganzas », he gave a voice to all the shadowy and phantom figures that raced through the zany contretemps — not by means of phonograph records, but directly, « in person », as the saying goes, talking from behind the screen on which the films were projected. Fregoli spoke the parts of each character and sang, when this was called for, to the accompaniment of the orchestra in the pit. Clearly, this ingenious fellow was not only a pioneer of the silent film but a precursor of the sound film as well. 1905 also saw Ambrosio's establishment, in Turin at 187 Stradale di Nizza, of a studio equipped with the latest technical innovations. And already the demand was exceeding the supply. The public was avid for films. By this time Turin had eleven public cinemas. Two years later, in Naples, Partenope Films, sponsored by the Tronconome brothers, was such a « busy bee-hive » of activity as to turn Naples into a little pre-war Hollywood. The first Italian film publication, according to Silvio Pappalardi, was The Lantern, founded in Naples, September 22nd, 1907, edited by Alessandro Pappalardi. Its aim, as it stated