Antonio Margheriti
Directing
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Antonio Margheriti (19 September 1930 – 4 November 2002), also known under the pseudonym Anthony M. Dawson, was a prolific Italian filmmaker. He was born in Rome and died in 2002 from a heart attack in Monterosi, Viterbo, near Rome at the age of 72. Margheriti started out in the Italian film industry in 1956 as a screenwriter. He started directing in 1960, his first film being "Spacemen" (aka "Assignment Outer Space"). Margheriti is known for his science fiction, horror, spaghetti western and action movies. He was the director of such cult movies as Cannibal Apocalypse, Castle of Blood, The Virgin of Nuremberg, Assignment Outer Space, Wild Wild Planet, Naked You Die, Mr. Super Invisible, The Last Hunter, Battle of the Worlds and numerous others. Most of his films were directed under the pseudonym of Anthony M. Dawson. He stopped using his real name in the USA early in his career, when he realized the English translation of the name "Antonio Margheriti" was "Anthony Daisies", and he thought it sounded too effeminate. He was the only Italian director who worked directly for American production companies like MGM, United Artists, 20th Century Fox, Columbia Pictures, etc. with films like: Yor, the Hunter from the Future, Take a Hard Ride, Killer Fish, etc. Margheriti said his action/adventure films were his favorites, and his least favorite movies were the sword-and-sandal peplum films he made in the early 1960s (such as "Devil of the Desert" and "Giants of Rome"). For years, director Richard Morrissey disputed Margheriti's claim that he had directed "Andy Warhol's Frankenstein" in the early 1970s, saying that Margheriti was mostly just a technical advisor on that film. Morrissey said Margheriti did however direct a very, very brief segment of the movie (mostly the scenes involving the two children roaming around in the lab). Margheriti worked with many well-known genre actors such as Lee Van Cleef, John Saxon, Claude Rains, John Morghen, Klaus Kinski, Barbara Steele, Reb Brown, Donald Pleasence, Yul Brynner, David Warbeck, Luciano Pigozzi, Marvin Hagler, Terence Hill, Fred Williamson, Christopher Lee and many others. Most of his later films were shot in the Philippines (especially his war films). Margheriti also collaborated on the special effects in two Italian cult films which he did not direct, Sergio Leone's "Fistful of Dynamite" (1971) and Aldo Lado's "The Humanoid" (1979). Margheriti retired from filmmaking in 1996 at age 66. He died in 2002 of natural causes. Margheriti's son Edoardo and his daughter Antonella are both also involved in filmmaking. Eli Roth's character in the 2009 Quentin Tarantino film Inglourious Bastards took Margheriti as his namesake. Description above from the Wikipedia article Antonio Margheriti, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Known For
At the beginning of the 1913 Mexican Revolution, greedy bandit Juan Miranda and idealist John H. Mallory, an Irish Republican Army explosives expert on the lam from the British, fall in with a band of revolutionaries plotting to strike a national bank. When it turns out that the government has been using the bank as a hiding place for illegally detained political prisoners -- who are freed by the blast -- Miranda becomes a revolutionary hero against his will.
Duck, You Sucker
Within the decadent walls of the Frankenstein mansion, the Baron and his depraved assistant Otto have discovered the means of creating new life. As the Baron's laboratory begins to fill up with stitched body parts, the Baroness dallies with the randy new manservant and soon the decadent, permissive household is consumed by an outrageous, bizarre and hilarious combination of death and dismemberment.
Flesh for Frankenstein
Treasure Island in Outer Space is a 1987 science fiction Italian and German television miniseries directed by Antonio Margheriti. It is based on the novel Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, setting the story in space on the year 2300. The series was produced by RAI Radiotelevisione Italiana in co-production with West Germany and France, and directed by Anthony M. Dawson. It is the biggest sci-fi production of Italian television. The miniseries of 5 episodes of 100 min was originally aired in Italy from November 19, 1987 on RAI Due channel. It was also adapted as a 120 min film. The miniseries is also known as Space Island (UK and Norway, USA on VHS) and Der Schatz im All (Germany).
Treasure Island in Outer Space
Interplanetary News reporter Ray Peterson is assigned aboard a space station in the 21st Century.
Assignment: Outer Space
Deathly ill Count Dracula and his slimy underling, Anton, travel to Italy in search of a virgin's blood. They're welcomed at the crumbling estate of indebted Marchese Di Fiore, who's desperate to marry off his daughters to rich suitors. But there, instead of pure women, the count encounters incestuous lesbians with vile blood and Marxist manservant Mario, who's suspicious of the aristocratic Dracula.
Blood for Dracula
During a hold-up in the Wild West, Dakota kills a rich old Chinese man, Wang. Later, he is captured, sentenced, and is about to be hanged - and he never profitted from Wang's death, has he buried him with the photographs of his four widows, and a few worthless papers. Meanwhile, Ho comes to America in search of his uncle's fortune, and must get Dakota free, as he his the only man who can lead him to Wang's tomb. They open the tomb, retaking the pictures of Wang's widows. It happens he reads the papers and knows that Wang had one quarter of a map tattooed in each of his women's buttocks. Now, the difficult part will really start... Treasure hunt.
The Stranger and the Gunfighter
Young Jim Hawkins finds himself serving with pirate captain Long John Silver in search of a buccaneer's treasure, in this short adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's classic tale.
Treasure Island
Jewel thieves attempt to recover treasure from piranha infested waters. Mistrust and betrayals happen amongst the gang in the quest for gold.
Killer Fish
The World of Yor (Italian: Il mondo di Yor) is a 1983 Italian fantasy adventure miniseries created and written by Antonio Margheriti for RAI 1. The four-part serial, based on Eugenio Juan Zappietro and Juan Zanotto's 1974 Argentine comic series Yor the Hunter (Henga el cazador), would later be edited into a feature-length film, Yor: The Hunter from the Future. Yor is an extremely blond prehistoric warrior who comes to question his origins, particularly with regard to a mysterious medallion he wears. When he learns of a desert goddess who supposedly wears the same medallion, Yor decides that he must find her and learn his true identity. Along the way, he encounters ape-men, dinosaurs, and a strange futuristic society.
The World of Yor
Stuck in a dream world of his own, Italian sculptor Albert Saporito, sometimes has difficulty separating truth from fiction. When he dreams that his gangster neighbor has been murdered, he reports the crime to the police, only to involve himself in a complicated situation.
Shoot Loud, Louder... I Don't Understand
A stray planet on a collision course with Earth instead takes orbit around our blue marble. What seems like a dead planet suddenly launches a fleet of flying saucers which attack our space fleets.
Battle of the Worlds
An American soldier and a British intelligence agent try to track down an ancient relic called the Golden Cobra, rumored to have supernatural powers. An early Raiders rip-off directed Antonio Margheriti.
The Hunters of the Golden Cobra
Lewis Collins is back to leading mercenaries on the move in Southeast Asia. This time the cast is unusually good including Lee Van Cleef, Brett Halsey (Cop Game), Romano Puppo (Robowar), Mike Monty (Raiders of Atlantis), Bobby Rhodes (The Great Alligator), etc. Anyway, Van Cleef has Collins go on some random mission to locate a disc with all sorts of valuable crazy intelligence data on it. It just happens that Donald Pleasence, a random government official, hires another mercenary-for-hire Manfred Lehman to tag along and make sure the data ends up in the right hands. Van Cleef isn't taking any chances, and since he is crooked and murders Collins's other bosses quickly, he places Romano Puppo in the group as well to make sure the operation runs smoothly. Collins may not be too expressive but at least he seems to figure out quickly who's out to get him, so the mission continues with lots of double-crosses, twists and turns, and of course lots of explosions!
The Commander
Hoping to overthrow his brother as ruler of the planet Metropolis, the evil Graal enlists the help of the insane Dr. Kraspin, who has invented a chemical capable of turning an ordinary person into a perfect soldier. They test this chemical on the pilot Golob, turning the unsuspecting victim into a mindless but indestructible automaton possessing superhuman strength. The people of Metropolis must somehow outwit Graal before he can create an army of these soldiers, or their planet will be destroyed.
The Humanoid
A half-breed Marine takes on greedy industrialists in the Amazonian rain forests. Marvelous Marvin proves his ability as a fighter!
Indio
Released from captivity in Vietnam, two American Army officers return to civilian life and discover they have acquired an insatiable taste for human flesh. A city is terrorised... as they stalk the inhabitants to satisfy their primitive appetites.
Cannibal Apocalypse
During the Vietnam war, an American soldier gets trapped beind enemy lines. A squad of his buddies sets out to rescue him.
The Last Hunter
After his cattle rancher boss dies, right-hand man Pike is given the job of returning $86,000 to some families who live across the border in Sonora, Mexico. Honest Pike is joined on the trip through the wilderness by a dishonest gambler named Tyree.
Take a Hard Ride
A detective duo hunts a criminal organization, which is using an unknown liquid explosive material.
Virtual Weapon
In a small Scottish village, horribly murdered bodies keep turning up. Suspicion falls upon the residents of a nearby castle that is haunted by a curse involving a killer cat.