Sunday, May 3, 2020
Stay At Home Bonus Film : Dario Argento's Five Days (1973)
Horror god Dario Argeto's one non-genre film is an often dark political tale set at the end of the Italian revolution. I was told it was funny, and there is some humor but mostly this is a political tale with an edge to it.
I am guessing almost none of you have seen it- even most Argent fans I know haven't. It is not so much the red headed step child so much as relative that is locked in the attic because they refuse to play by the rules. No one talks about it. I mean no one.
Odds are if you can find it it probably won't be in English. Somewhere in my vast collection I have a copy that is in English but I honestly have no idea where it is.
In suddenly deciding to post this film I had a devil of time finding it- all the Argento links on You Tube are related to the films we know and love. I found a gorgeous copy in German but this is an English Language website so that creates problems. Eventually noodling around I found the link above...
....which means I have to explain- to see it in English or any other language than Italian you must turn on the closed captions then go into settings and pick the autotranslate option and pick your language. While this is not ideal since the translation can be from the moon, it is at east a way of seeing a largely hidden film. If you like what you seen you can always chase down a better version.
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When you say you have a copy in English, do you mean subtitled in English, or dubbed? I'd always guessed there was never an English dub made since it seemed like such a specifically Italian story, but part of me always hoped that maybe they did make one thinking that Argento was a big enough director name that maybe they'd get it picked up if not in America, then in other English-speaking countries. Can you elaborate?
ReplyDeleteI have a subtitled in English copy that I picked up at a nostalgia con here in New York.(I have no idea where it is right at this moment in that half my collection is in storage) I have no idea what the source was. I didn't even know the film existed until the guy at the table pointed it out. He had just gotten it himself and he knew I tended toward thriller, mytery and horror films so he figure Argento would interest me. I think he said it was a kind of pet project for Argento, and as you said the the name would attract attention outside of Italy. The subtitles were actually good, which leads me to believe that somewhere out there there is a good subtitled version. Though I don't know where since relatively recently one of the local theaters did a retrospective of all Argento's films and they couldn't turn that one up. At one point I was supposed to interview him and I wanted to talk to him about that film but plans changed and illness struck his availability disappeared.
ReplyDeleteLooks like this is available on Amazon Prime video in the US with English Subtitle. Wish I could watch it but in Canada.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.amazon.com/Five-Days-Milan-Adriano-Celentano/dp/B07GBWPCVS