Itala Film was an Italian

film production Filmmaking (film production) is the process by which a motion picture is produced. Filmmaking involves a number of complex and discrete stages, starting with an initial story, idea, or commission. It then continues through screenwriting, cast ...

company.

Silent era

It was founded during the

silent era A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, when ...

. In 1905, industrialists Carlo Rossi and William Remmert established a company in

Turin Turin ( , Piedmontese language, Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital ...

, recruiting filmmakers from

Pathé Pathé or Pathé Frères (, styled as PATHÉ!) is the name of various French businesses that were founded and originally run by the Pathé Brothers of France starting in 1896. In the early 1900s, Pathé became the world's largest film equipment ...

. Two years later, they were joined by

Giovanni Pastrone Giovanni Pastrone, also known by his artistic name Piero Fosco (13 September 1883 – 27 June 1959), was an Italian film pioneer, director, screenwriter, actor and technician. Pastrone was born in Montechiaro d'Asti. He worked during the era o ...

who reorganised the company as Itala. Over the next decade, the company enjoyed enormous growth, aided by signing up Pathé's most popular comedian André Deed. Further development came with the company's production of historical

epic film Epic films are a style of filmmaking with large-scale, sweeping scope, and spectacle. The usage of the term has shifted over time, sometimes designating a film genre and at other times simply synonymous with big-budget filmmaking. Like epics in ...

s beginning with ''

The Fall of Troy The Fall of Troy is an American rock band from Mukilteo, Washington. The band is a trio consisting of Thomas Erak (guitars, vocals, keyboards), Andrew Forsman (drums, percussion) and Tim Ward (bass, screamed vocals) who was later replaced by Fra ...

'', allowing the company to open a

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

office to sell the films in the American market. This policy was crowned with the success of Pastrone's 1914 epic ''

Cabiria ''Cabiria'' is a 1914 Italian epic silent film, directed by Giovanni Pastrone and shot in Turin. The film is set in ancient Sicily, Carthage, and Cirta during the period of the Second Punic War (218–202 BC). It follows a melodramatic ma ...

'' set in

Ancient Rome In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom ...

. The company continued to make epics along with literary adaptations while

Maciste Maciste () is one of the oldest recurring characters of cinema, created by Gabriele d'Annunzio and Giovanni Pastrone. He is featured throughout the history of the cinema of Italy from the 1910s to the mid-1960s. He is usually depicted as a Herc ...

, the most popular character in ''Cabiria'', appeared in further films. However by 1918, Pastrone had lost control of Itala, and the following year the company was absorbed into the conglomerate Unione Cinematografica Italiana which itself collapsed after only a few years. In 1926, the former Turin studios of Itala, now derelict, were acquired as part of the growing film empire of Stefano Pittaluga who already owned the Fert Studios in the city.Moliterno p.166

Recycle

In the early 1930s, the Itala Film name was recycled for a

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitu ...

-based company established by the producer Alberto Giacalone. The company specialised in co-productions, or Italian versions of German films. In 1937, Giacalone relocated to

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus ( legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

, with the firm continuing to operate until 1955.

References

Bibliography

* Moliterno, Gino. ''The A to Z of Italian Cinema''. Scarecrow Press, 2009. Film production companies of Italy Film distributors of Italy {{IT-film-company-stub