Virna Lisi: death of a golden haired beauty!

Almost at the end of the year 2014, on December 18th, the Italian, world  and genre cinema has to say goodbye to one of its most prominent members the talented and beautiful actress Virna Lisi, born as Virna Lisa Pieralisi, on November 8th 1936, hence 78 years old, which in my humble opinion is much to young to die. She was often regarded as the Italian Marilyn Monroe. She started her career in 1953 and worked untill her untimely death in cinema and television, winning several national and international movie awards like at the Cannes Film Festival. Virna Lisi worked with all the great directors and actors/actresses of her time during more than 114 movie and television credits.

Fans of Marisa Mell will always remember Virna Lisi in the movie "Casanova 70" with Marcello Mastroianni and "Le Dolce Signore" with Ursulla Andress and Claudine Auger.  

It was only last month that the golden haired actress heared from her doctors that she had an uncurable disease and would not have long to live. Virna Lisi died peacefully today surrounded by her family and friends in Rome, Italy.

Walter Giller dies at age 84!

On December 15th 2011, one of Germany's most beloved actors "Walter Giller" died at age 84 due to lung cancer related complications. Walter Giller is regarded as one of the post WOII titans in German cinema and television with more than 137 credits in this field to his name next to his other works in theatre, on radio and other media platforms. More than 55 years he was married to another German grande dame in movie and television making the actress "Nadia Tiller". Walter Giller died surrounded by his close family in a retirement home. Fans of Marisa Mell will remember him as "Woody Johnson" in the 1964 movie "Der Letzte Ritt nach Santa Cruz" where he portrayed a rather cowardly man who had to face the bandits on the run. On this very rare behind the scene picture from 1963 we see from left to right: Thomas Fritsch, Marisa Mell, Walter Giller, Marianne Koch and Mario Adorf! Marianne Koch would one year later become "Marisol" in Sergio Leone's über cult classic "A Fistfull of Dollars" with Clint Eastwood. Mario Adorf  would meet Marisa Mell again four years later in the Italian comedy "Le Dolci Signori" with Ursula Andress. Although this picture is a happy behind the scene setting it is a rather revealing picture when you look at the body language of the actors. First you see three groups of people: on the left you have Thomas Fritsch standing alone, then you have Marisa Mell and Walter Giller close together standing higher than the other actors and finally the third group of Marianne Koch and Mario Adorf. When you look deeper into the picture you can see clearly that Marisa Mell and Walter Giller are lovers at the moment of the production of this movie! Although he was married to Nadia Tiller at the time he clearly is in love with her and most of all she is also with him. The love affair is being kept secret to the public at large but the insiders know it very well and the body language reveals it! How??? First they are standing together as a couple a little higher? Secondly they are standing very close to each other, Walter Giller is touching with his right arm the left breast of Marisa Mell which is a very intimate gesture that she would not have accepted if it were otherwise. Compare that posture with the other couple on the picture Marianne Koch and Mario Adorf who are also standing very close but keep each to themselves as they are not lovers but good friends. Marianne Koch has even the tumbs of her hands in the pocktes of her trousers which means that she protects her personality like when people make a fist around their thumbs with their fingers. Another giveaway that Marisa Mell and Walter Giller are lovers is the fact that they deliberately touch each other with their legs in an intimate way. Walter bends his right leg to touch the wall, but Marisa Mell crosses her right leg over her left leg being able to touch Walter's which is not an innocent gesture! And finally the ultimate gesture of Marisa Mell in connecting with her man is that her hips or the centre of her womenhood is connecting with the hips of Walter Giller meaning that she is completely infatuated with this man. Compare this gesture with the other couple where you can clearly see a gap between Marianne Koch and Mario Adorf. The fact that they are not looking at each other is just a little diversion to distract their secret relation. So it is clear that at picture can say more than a thousand words!
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Thanks to André Schneider for signaling the sad news of Walter Giller's death!

Body Double with Sybil Danning!

This week I was watching an episode of the cult German krimi series "Derrick" played by former Edgar Wallace movie actor Horst Tappert as inspector Stephan Derrick and Fritz Klein as his eternal side kick Harry Klein. The episode was called "Zeichen der Gewalt", first broadcast in 1975 on May 4th by the commercial state television station "ZDF". The episode was part 8 in a very long running series of 281 episodes covering 25 seasons (!) from 1974 untill 1998. This German krimi was and still is one of the most succesfull television series ever being broadcast in more than 100 countries in the world. Even today in countries like France there is still on one channel or another a re-run of Derrick and Italy is probably a country having the most Derrick fans knowing every episode by heart, who did what to whom and why and connecting every episode with every guest star.

And guest stars there were a lot during its run! Although Derrick was a fairly common detective series it came in a time in the mid 70's when a lot of actors and actresses made, more or less out of necessity, the transition from cinema into television. And they were not only B-actors or actresses. During its run you could see parts played by Curd Jürgens, Horst Buchholz, Klaus Maria Brandauer, Gunther Stoll, Götz George, Lili Palmer, Karin Baal, Judy Winter, Ushi Glas, Maria Schell, Cornelia Fröboes,... and exciting was the fact that one of those stars could be the murderer which was fairly new at that time in part a trend the American crime series "Columbo" with Peter Falk had started at the beginning of the 1970's.

The episode "Zeichen der Gewalt" tells the story of a Bavarian gangster played by beefcake Raimund Harmstorf, fresh from his mega success "Der Seewolf", escaping from prison by black mailing a lawyer into giving him a gun in prison after which he kills a guard while breaking free! On the run he hides in a night club which he used to run as a manager. So after the killing of the guard Derrick comes in to investigate the murder and trying to find the gangster. Obviously the trail of the killer leads Derrick to his previous work place and while Derrick is there the lights go down... and a striptease begins performed by the wife of the gangster.

After having seen this striptease I was silent for some time, not quite realising what I had just seen. Ok, the striptease was fairly dull and uninspired but I had some kind of déjà vue. The actress I had recognized as a very young Sybil Danning, later to become a major B-star in American action movies during the Reagan era of the mid 80's in the same vein as Birgit Nielsen. What was it that stunned me??? I had to look again at that part of the show. In the back of my mind, a suspicion began to form. Oh, my God! This could not be possible??? Could it??? After having seen the striptease for several times I was fairly sure that my suspicion was correct! It had to be!

The part of stripper performed by Sybil Danning was a part that originally had been offered to Marisa Mell. Now I was certain! Sybil Danning was so much looking like Marisa Mell, almost a body double! The same length of hair, the same cut, the same make up, the same body language, the same movements and look in the camera... everything oozed Marisa Mell only she was not on screen... it was a body double! My whole being knew that this was correct only how to prove it??? My first instinct told me to look in the direction of the Edgar Wallace movies. After the collapse of the Edgar Wallace franchise in the mid '70's, a lot of directors like Helmuth Ashley, director of Marisa Mell's Edgar Wallace movie "Das Rätsel der roten Orchidee" or the ultimate Edgar Wallace director Alfred Vohrer with 14 movies, switched trades to Derrick. They knew how to make a good krimi like in the 60's but now updated for television. But... it was no use! There was no connection. But who was the director of this episode??? It was Theodor Grädler! And then I knew!

Theodor Grädler was the second director on the 1972 made for television movie "Elisabeth-Ich möchte ein Möve sein!" After the ZDF rejected the first cut of the movie by Jörg Eggers it was partially reshot with a second director none other than Theodor Grädler. So there you had it! Theodor Grädler knew Marisa Mell very well after having worked with her on this tv movie which had a lot of flack during its production days! Once he got the script for the episode "Zeichen der Gewalt" in the series Derrick, he must have thought of Marisa Mell for the part of the wife and stripper. He knew she had done several memorable stripteases in her movie career like in "Le Dolce Signore" or in "Una Sull'Altra". She was perfect for the role! I am certain that the part was offered to her. One reason or another, she did not accept it! Was it that she thought she was to old to do it??? Was it that she did not wanted to do television anymore after the debacle of the Elisabeth movie??? Was it because she found the role to lean and not worthy of her talent??? Or was it that she had enough of being again a stripper??? Who knows??? She did not do it in person but the whole scene in the episode has the spirit of Marisa Mell! In the end Marisa Mell did not ever appear as a guest star on the Derrick series like other more famous stars did. Personally I find this a pity, rather strange knowing her talent and screen presence and a hole in the filmography of Marisa Mell. I would have so much have liked to have seen her opposite Horst Tappert playing a victim or a murderer with her husky voice, emerald green eyes and sensuous looks. That would have been grant. Fortunately there are other stripteases of Marisa Mell to marvel at like the one from Una Sull'Altra, her most famous one!

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Would you like to know more about Derrick, the stars and the episodes?

The Derrick Fan-blog is your one and only stop:

http://derrick-fan.blogspot.com/

Thanks for the use of the pictures in this entry!

"Mata Hari"-Dress Rehearsal (World Exclusive!)

Since the inception of the Marisa Mell Blog several entries have been dedicated to the musical "Mata Hari" from producer David Merrick, directed by Vincente Minnelli, starring Marisa Mell and "Bonaza"-star Pernell Roberts. Fresh from the success in movies like "Le Dolci Signore" or "Danger: Diabolik!" in the second half of the 60's the powers that be found it time to transfer Euro-beauty Marisa Mell from Italy to the USA in the wake of other Italian sirens like Sophia Loren, Gina Lollobrigida, Claudia Cardinale, Virna Lisi.... The fact that she was not Italian but Austrian did not matter. Her appearence was all Italian-like with thick auburn hair, big emerald green eyes and lush voluptious lips. What could you ask for more??? After several appearences in magazines like Vogue and McCall's introducing her to the American audience it was time to throw her into the deep end of the showbizz waters, ready or not! And ready she was not! Being trained as a theatre and movie actress she had no idea what it required to be a musical actress. Although there is a lot in common between the two disciplines its major requirement is that, next to being a stage presence, you need to be trained as a musical singer. Not a common singer of pop songs or classical pieces but in the specific technique of using your singing voice on stage while acting. So you need to master two disciplines. And Marisa Mell was no singer. That was a talent she had not! She could dance, sword fight, ride a horse,... but singing she could not! Compare the 1995 re-recording of the musical sung by professional musical singers with the 1967 bootleg recording then you know what I mean. So the whole adventure in the USA turned into a disaster for her. After a try-out in Washington, D.C., the whole show was canceled and never got to Broadway much to dispair of Marisa Mell. She had high hopes that this production of "Mata Hari" would be her ticket to the USA and showbizz. It did not! She came back one year later very disappointed and desperate. People close to her mention that in fact she never recovered from it and was scarred for life! Others clame that this gave her carreer a whole other direction and was the beginning of her downfall as an A-list actress, once starring opposite Marcello Mastroianni in "Casanova 70".
"Mata Hara" is only a footnote in the musical dictionaries mentioning the musical flop that it was. So there is not much material available on the memorabelia market. Luckily there is the bootleg recording of the production with the voices of the entire cast, including Marisa Mell, speaking her role as Mata Hari with a singing pitch! We are still waiting for original film footage of the production to appear. And now there are these pictures. In my knowledge they have never been published before in any magazine in the world since the days of the production. They show Marisa Mell during a dress rehearsel of the musical on stage. From today's point of view and even from the 60's point of view they are horrible. Marisa Mell had a very sexy slime figure in those days but by the looks of it the producers did everything to cover and distract from it. They are big, dark, depressive and formless cloths. Maybe they should have reflected the poverty of the character or the dispair from World War I. Even Audrey Hepburn in "My Fair Lady", starting out as Eliza Doolittle, the poor flower girl in Victorian London, had more beaufitul cloths than this. If these pictures give some kind of impression of the production quality than it is no wonder that, with everything else we know at the moment, this production was a faillure from the beginning. What is even more a mystery is that these cloths were drawn and made by Irene Sharaff, a 5-time Academy Award winner for productions like West Side Story, The King and I and... Cleopatra with Elisabeth Taylor. Maybe she had a headache the morning when she drew these cloths after a long night of partying and boozing in town? Who knows!

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The pictures come from the personal archieve of Marisa Mell thanks to Guido from Italy!

"Anyone Can Play" with Netflix!

One of the lost movies of Marisa Mell, never having had an official VHS or DVD release, made in 1968 with other Eurostars Ursula Andress, Virna Lisi and Claudine Auger is the movie "Le Dolci Signore" or "Anyone Can Play". This comedy has been hardly ever seen since those days except on some local television stations during the red eye broadcast hours and mostly in a cut version.
So I was very pleased to hear from Marisa Mell fan "Dan" from Chicago that the movie-on-demand "Netflix" in the USA made this movie avalaible in her catalogue for the American audience. Knowing the quality of the prints and mostly the uncut versions of a movie they use this is really a treat for all Marisa Mell fans to see this movie for the first time in more than 40 years as it should been!

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Thanks Dan from Chicage for pointing this one out!

Movie Marquees!

While in Paris (France) last week and the beginning of this week, I was walking one night along the Boulevard de Strassbourg. During this walk I was happy to see that some traditions have not (yet) died out in our present day society! What am I talking about? Well, along the Boulevard there is a nice little cosy theatre, as there are still many in Paris, but this one still had a big old style marquee on its front wall like in the old days with the name of the actress/cabaretière on it in bright big lights together with the name of the programme that she was bringing. In the last century, theatre and movie marquees were "the" way to announce a programme. Sadly, when a lot of theatres and cinemas were replaced by modern movieplexes and big concrete theatres these often beautiful crafted marquees disappeared to be replaced by dull displays.
So during my walk I wondered what it would be like to see a Marisa Mell film on a movie marquee during the end of the 60's and the beginning of the 70's when these were still around. Unfortunately, to my knowledge, there excist no pictures of these movie marquees with a Marisa Mell movie on it but thanks to the magic of the internet I created these marquees to get a sense what they might have looked like in the past!

Meet me in Paris!

Today I am leaving for Paris (France) to take a little break untill next week. So I found it quite appropriate to publish for this entry a beautiful rare behind the scene picture of Marisa Mell during her stay in Paris in 1967 in the month of February during her shoot of the movie "Le Dolci Signore" with other Eurostars Ursula Andress, Claudine Auger and Virna Lisi. The picture is dated February 23rd 1967. It is part of the Granger Collection hence the watermark on the picture!

SATANKA.

During the height of the Spy Craze in the 60's around the world ignited by the monstrous success of the James Bond movies and franchise a new genre of movies surfaced build around the concept of the secret agent. Very quick in all segments of the media like television, books,... the secret agent appeared to save the world. The secret agent was not only restricted to the male agent but also the sexy female secret agents started to mingle in the deadly game to save the world. Best known from the 60's are "Honey West" played by Anne Francis, "Fathom Harvill" played by Raquel Welch or "Irma Eckman" played by Elke Summer.

Everybody tried to cash in on this money making machine so comics could not stay behind and soon the James Bond novels written by Ian Fleming were adapted into comics for news papers. Even in this medium, the secret agent concept wrecked havoc and was a run of the mill success. All over the world, secret agent comics were popping up. South America was no execption.

And where something in pop culture is a success, making fun of it soon follows so in 1968 a comic magazine in the style of the American magazine "Mad" under the name of "El Pingüino" based in Chili wanted a spoof comic making fun of the sexy female secret agent. Hence secret agent SATANKA. was born.

Satanka. is the sexy top secret agent working for an organisation called "C.I.D.R.A". In her quest to save the world from the evil organisation "SRONIA" she is helped by two other female agents known as "Rock" and "Roll".

Satanka. is the brain child of the Argentinian creator Hector German Oesterheld with the help of fellow Argentinian artist Angel "Lito" Fernandez. Herctor German Oesterheld or also known as "HGO" was one of Argentina's top comic book script writers. He was member of the Venice group who's members were also Mario Faustinelli, creator of "Kolosso", Hugo Pratt, creator of "Corto Maltesse" or Dino Battaglia, creator of "Ispettore Coke".

The sexy secret agent Satanka. was quite a succes in South America. So one day a journalist asked the creator Hector German Oesterheld where his inspiration came from to create his heroine. HGO answered that his femme fatale was modeled after the Austrian actress Marisa Mell. He told that Marisa Mell embodied physically everything that a secret agent should have and be to save the world. So Marisa Mell became Satanka. in the comics of the comic magazine "Pengüino". And this is not strange. Not many people in Europe and even the rest of world know that Marisa Mell in the 60's was a big star in South America. Her movies like "Danger: Diabolik!" or "Le Dolci Signori" were big hits in countries like Argentina and Chili. Her face and name were house hold. Like in Spain at that moment in time, she appeared almost every week on the cover of a magazine or in articles in the yellow press. Probably the 1965 movie "Masquerade" made quite an impression on HGO because in this movie Marisa Mell was the template for Satanka. as seen on the photo above.

And here this entry should have ended! Unfortunately it does not! Next to his profession as a comic book scripter, Hector German Oesterheld was also a critical journalist in Argentina situated on the left hand side of politics. In that capacity he wrote among others one of the best biographies of "Ernesto 'Che' Guevarra" also in 1968, the year that he created Satanka. or one of the most critical biographies of Evita Perron in 1970 making an end to the pop cultural idolization of her life. During the 70's, it is believed that HGO and his four adult daughters joined the leftish political organisation "Montoneros".

In 1976 Oesterheld disappeared to be never seen again. A year later his daughters, Diana (21), Beatriz (19), Estela (25) and Marina (18), were arrested by the Argentine armed forces in La Plata, and were also never seen again. Next his daughters' husbands were also among those that vanished. The dictorship in Argentina removed each and everyone against them. Only a grandson, Martín, born in captivity and recovered from the government by Oesterheld's widow, Elsa Sánchez, was rescued and raised by her. A second grandson, Fernando, born earlier, was raised by his paternal grandparents. When a journalist asked a member of the dictatorship what had happened to Oesterheld he aswered: "We did away with him because he wrote such a great biography of Che Guevara!" (Sigh!). Nobody knows what happened to Oesterheld, how he was tortured and ultimately died a cruel death around 1977-1978 but several other journalists in prison at the same time claim to have seen him alive in january of 1978. After that date all traces dispear in the mists of time! Sadly this is one story of many many many stories in Argentina. In our memories Hector German Oesterheld will always be remembered as a great artist and journalist. And that is something that no political regime can take away how hard and bloody they try to do. R.I.P.

UPDATE - March 8th 2011
In this entry about the comic heroine "Satanka." I mentioned that: "He (HGO) was member of the Venice group who's members were also Mario Faustinelli, creator of "Kolosso", Hugo Pratt, creator of "Corto Maltesse" or Dino Battaglia, creator of "Ispettore Coke"."

I got a nice mail from an Argentinian journalist, comic expert on everything Argentinian comics and artist Carlos R. Martinez telling me that: "Osterheld was not a member of the Venice group. He worked with Hugo Pratt when this artist came to Argentina in 1950." Thanks Carlos for this clarification and info.

Carlos has a great own blog called

"Top-Comics: Blog sobre la historieta argentina y mundial creado por Luis Rosales (1944-2009)"

You can visit his blog at : http://luisalberto941.wordpress.com/

Highly recommended.

The Actress Formerly Known As "Marisa Mell"!

Marisa Mell was born under her civil name Marlies Moitzi as an Austrian citizen. At the beginning of her career, she quickly understood that this civil name was not a name for a famous actress that she dreamed of becoming. So like almost all actors and actresses she decided to change her name to her alter ego Marisa Mell. But having a new name is not a guarantee that everybody in showbizz knows your name or knows how to write your name. Marisa Mell made one movie in England called "French Dressing". Although not a success at that time, the British movie and glamour magazines still followed her career from a distance. So in 1968 Marisa Mell appeared in a glamour magazine called "Girl Illustrated" with the above photo and a little accompanying article about her. The article starts by giving "Marisa Mell" a new name as "Melissa Mell". Then the writer gives us some revelations by telling us that we have here "...an instance which discounts the cynical view that beauty and brains make strange bedfellow. Melissa is a very successful actress which means that she is highly talented." and "...she is at present in Rome starring in "Luigi Zampa" and "...She is no stranger to British screens". Well, you have to admit that the writer did a hell of a job to write in only 5 sentences such a bullshit. This photo is a publicity still from her French 1966 movie "Objectif 500 millions" which had to have an accompanying publicity text with synopsis of the movie and credits of the people involved in creating this movie. How is it possible to change the name "Marisa Mell" into "Melissa Mell" with the correct information at hand? Maybe the writer was in need of new glasses and wrote the article while waiting before entering the pratice of an optician. Then we get another assumption that defies all logic. So now we know that to become a successfull actress you have to be highly talented. So all succesful actresses are talented? Sigh! Then we come to the next shocker! A new Marisa Mell movie that I have never heard of called "Luigi Zampa"! What??? The movie is actually called "Le Dolci Signore" and was directed by Luigi Zampa! And finally Marisa Mell is no stranger to British screens. That was an enormous exageration. I doubt it very much that the British cinema goer would have known when asked who Marisa Mell was or which movies she had played in. She was not a household name in England like Brigitte Bardot, Gina Lollobrigida, Sophia Loren, Elke Sommer... or other famous European actresses.

Here is another original way to re-name "Marisa Mell" into "Mariza Mel" on a poster from a foreign magazine with a classic picture by photographer Angelo Frontoni. And then we have the ultimate name mistake for Marisa Mell by a man who should have known much better.

In 1997 Quentin Tarantino's third movie "Jackie Brown" premiered. Quentin Tarantino was the hot cookie in Hollywood after his recent successes with Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction. Stuffing his movies with subtle and not so subtle references to Eurocult movies, actors and actresses it came to no surprize to me that during the course of the storyline some of characters are watching a movie in the living room on a TV screen called "La Belva col Mitra" with Marisa Mell and Helmut Berger. The movie is famous for the violent behaviour of Helmut Berger in the course of the story and the rape of Marisa Mell by Berger.

When I saw this movie for the first time I wondered if and if so how and where Marisa Mell would be credited for her appearence. Great was my astonishment when I saw the end credits of the movie. In a long list of thank you's I read the name of Marisa Mell written as "Marisa Mel" with one "L" instead of two "LL". What??? Here you have a director who makes movies mostly as pastiches of other peoples work, storylines, creativity... and always credits himself upon his knowledge on everything Eurocult finding probabely "La Belva col Mitra" one of the better Italian eurocrime movies unable to write correctly the name of the female star of the cult movie he incorporated in his own movie. I know that Quentin Tarantino is not responsable for writting the end credits of his movies but some little gnom in a back office of a production company did it but nevertheless... it is his movie from beginning to the end. There does not end my story. Thanks to this little mistake so many years ago there are still a few concequences to be payed. By dropping one "L" in the name Marisa Mell to Marisa Mel, the people responsable for the Internet Movie Data Base (IMDB) updates created a new actress file for the actress "Marisa Mel" with only one movie credit to her name i.c. Jackie Brown! A short career indeed for this women.

Another concesquence is that the same people updating the IMDB categorically refuse to update the filmography for Marisa Mell with another movie credit for the movie "Jackie Brown" solely on the fact that her name was written with one "L" and not two "LL".

So to them the career of Marisa Mell ended with the movie "I Love Vienna" from 1991 and not the 1997 starrer "Jackie Brown" which would be correct. IMDB lists as credit almost every creative aspect of movie making from director to producer to caterer and goofer. So why not updating Marisa Mell's filmography with this movie?

Marisa Mell or Melissa Mell or Mariza Mel or Marisa Mel or... whatever her name is in the movie "La Belva col Mitra"!

Thanks to Paula Titterton for giving me the idea for this entry and contributing the photo and article from the magazine "Girl Illustrated".

The Golden Girls

1968 was a very good year in the career of Marisa Mell, not only did she make the cult classic Mario Bava's "Danger: Diabolik!" , a movie called "Stuntman" but also "Le Dolci Signore" or in English "Anyone Can play". The movie was directed by Luigi Zampa and co-written by the famous Italian director Ettore Scola and his writing partner Ruggero Maccari.

In this movie Marisa Mell plays the role of "Paola" together with some of the best known female stars in European cinema at that moment: Claudine Auger, Virna Lisi and Ursula Andress.

Ursula Andress has top billing on this movie and does not really need any introduction because she was the first Bond girl as "Honey Rider" in the first James Bond movie "Dr. No". Another Bond girl is also part of this team of liberated women, Claudine Auger from France. She was Bond's inside girl "Dominique - Domino - Derval" in the movie "Thunderball". And finally Lisi Virna from Italy, famous from euuuhhhh..., maybe from the Richard Burton starrer "Bluebeard" in 1972.

The movie is build as a comedy around these four ladies with their stories involving the men in their lives played by Jean-Pierre Cassel, Frank Wolff, Mario Adorf and Lando Buzzanca. Although the movie has these four beautiful women as stars, the movie itself did not make any headlines. As a publicity vehicle it did do its job. The four sirens got tons of media attention in the latino world ranging from France, Italy, Spain to all the countries in Central and South America. Each and every magazine got them on the cover and had some kind of articles about them in their editions. For Marisa Mell the movie will be remembered for her sensual striptease. In the movie she is addicted to do stripteases and in the end her husband agrees with it and stimulates her.

Forty years later, the stars have matured into golden girls with a golden movie memory. Although the movie has some of the 60's best loved female stars, the movie was never, by my knowledge, released on DVD, officially or unofficially. Maybe the time is right to do so!

Le dolci signore - Belgian poster anyone?

Before the existence of the internet, production companies had to promote their movies with the means of that time at their disposal. In the 60's and 70's it was mainly through the printed media with posters, flyers, leaflets, pressbooks, lobby-cards... Each movie had several versions of their posters mostly painted or drawn with the most alluring scene's of the movie as a focus. In the mid '80's the production companies used more and more movie stills to compose their posters and the art of movie poster drawing disappeared in the background. Using stills was much cheaper then appointing and paying an artist to draw the posters. Who doesn't know the stunning drawings of Robert McGinnis with his posters for the James Bond movies with Sean Connery which are etched in our subconcious for ever. So having an eye catching poster was of the utmost importance and could often make or break a movie. Therefore almost always the production company told the foreign distributors what kind of movie poster they were allowed to produce in their home markets to sell the movie to the audience. Most American layouts were re-styled to fit the needs of the local foreign market. It was often the American poster with the foreign title and a re-arranging of the eye-catchers of the original American poster. Although this was true for most countries in the world there was one country that had it's own policy of promoting a movie: Belgium. Since the beginning of the movie history Belgium had a front runners role with people like Pierre Plateau and his Fenakistiscoop in 1831 which became the basis for the movie industry or a first showing of a movie by the brothers Lumière in Brussels, the capital of Belgium in 1896. Belgium was also in the centre of the Art Nouveau movement at that time with Victor Horta so when the two art forms, movies and art movement, found each other they produced some stunning examples of movie poster art. This tradition was carried over to the 60's and 70's and was never questioned by American production companies. For the Belgian market a new layout was drawn by mostly Belgian artists whom became masters in their craft. The Belgian poster is mostly in a horizontal style and has two titles, one in Flemish, the language of the majority of the Belgian people and French. Because most American production companies had their European seat in Paris (France) the translations of the (American) titles of the movies was often literally which often didn't correspond with the Flemish language and had a funny meaning to the Flemish people. A classic example is the Garry Cooper movie "High Noon" which becomes "De Trein Zal Drie Maal Fluiten" in Flemish or "The Train Will Whistle Three Times". So the Italian title "Le dolce signore" meaning "The Sweet Gentlemen" referring to the adulterous affaires of the married women in the movie becomes in English "Anyone can play", in French "Pas folles les mignonnes" and in Flemish "Niet gek de schatjes" meaning "Not crazy the cute ones". Nevertless the Belgian poster for "Le dolci signore" with Marisa Mell is one of the best Belgian posters with the stunning faces of Marisa Mell, Ursula Andress, Virna Lisi and Claudine Auger. The faces are life like drawn and have a realistic feel to it. Most of the faces and figures on other Belgian posters are drawn in a cartoon kind of way and not very realistic. Because the movie has no real action scenes, they are missing on the poster so you get only the four faces of the main actresses, their names, the director and color process and titles in the two languages and that's it. Plain and simple! Maybe to simple because the film was not a hit and got lost in the depth of oblivion!

In contrast to this poster is the poster of the French movie "Angelique" with French cult star Michèle Mercier as the heroine. In my opinion this is one of the most beautiful erotic and attractive Belgian movie posters ever made.