On what would have been his 95th birthday we remember Demofilo Fidani, who was born on February 8, 1914 in Cagliari, Sardinia. I won’t even attempt to list the plethora of pseudonyms he used during his career as producer, director, screenwriter and actor but he will be best remembered for one… Miles Deem. He is often referred to as the Ed Wood of Spaghetti westerns. Deem used a company of leading actors such as Jeff Cameron, Hunt Powers, Gordon Mitchell, Klaus Kinski and of course his daughter Simone Blondell. Fidani was married to Maria Rosa Valenza Vitelli, screenwriter, costume designer and anything else he could credit her for to draw another paycheck. Whether you think of his films as good or bad Fidani has put together quite a cult following and is one of the better known directors of the genre. His films have an amateur look to them and often are loaded with riding scenes to fill up time. Fidani died on March 17, 1994 in Rome at the age of 80. Has anyone seen all of his Spaghetti westerns?
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Remembering Demofilo Fidani
On what would have been his 95th birthday we remember Demofilo Fidani, who was born on February 8, 1914 in Cagliari, Sardinia. I won’t even attempt to list the plethora of pseudonyms he used during his career as producer, director, screenwriter and actor but he will be best remembered for one… Miles Deem. He is often referred to as the Ed Wood of Spaghetti westerns. Deem used a company of leading actors such as Jeff Cameron, Hunt Powers, Gordon Mitchell, Klaus Kinski and of course his daughter Simone Blondell. Fidani was married to Maria Rosa Valenza Vitelli, screenwriter, costume designer and anything else he could credit her for to draw another paycheck. Whether you think of his films as good or bad Fidani has put together quite a cult following and is one of the better known directors of the genre. His films have an amateur look to them and often are loaded with riding scenes to fill up time. Fidani died on March 17, 1994 in Rome at the age of 80. Has anyone seen all of his Spaghetti westerns?
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I've only seen a couple of them, one was a Django/Sartana team up with lots of stuntmen flying around after they got shot, lots of horse riding scenes, and Gordon Mitchell as a crazed bandit who played poker with himself in a mirror (and cheated). It was pretty good.
ReplyDeleteI thought if you had seen one or two of his Spaghetti Westerns you had pretty much seen them all! ha ha ha!
ReplyDeleteJust kidding...
I have seen a bunch of them, but don't know if I have seen them all. I kinda doubt that I have.
Anyway..
I just wanted to say that his film DEAD MEN DON'T MAKE SHADOWS is actually a favorite of mine.