Lamberto Bava's Fantaghiro Series 1

I love a good Fantasy series, and several years ago I found my way to the part of Lamberto Bava's filmography that featured a large amount of series that were produced for television that are exactly that.  While you won't find exploding hookers, monstrous mutilation or even a touch of heavy metal music, you will find that Bava can apply his directorial skills on a larger scale than his smaller horror films would ever indicate.  While Demons may be a favorite for many of us here in the Tomb, the popularity of that film is certainly dwarfed by that of his long running and still beloved by those petitioning for more, FANTAGHIRO!  

The first time I saw this was in the export version as CAVE OF THE GOLDEN ROSE, and it plays perfectly as a contained mini-series.  I might never have bumped across it if I had not been curious about another one of his Tele-Fantasy series, Desideria / The Dragon Ring, a series that has the distinction of casting Anna Falchi in the lead.  That was very good, as was Caraibi (review here), but Fantaghiro would be popular enough to spawn four sequel series and have fans and message boards from all points between Italy, the US and Yugoslavia (Lamberto is big in Yugoslavia!!) that run to this day.  You want to see how popular this is, search for the series on Ebay and be sure to look at all the international auctions. Complete DVD boxsets from Germany, Italy and other territories are common, yet somehow the US market missed out. Perhaps it is too naive, but I think it would be a great series for young girls and boys-and hey...it isn't all sweetness and light.  I can't even imagine the level of freak out the first series would have once Fantaghiro really gets into her first major bit of trouble, in the jaws of a sacred beast that loves to eat women.

A little bit of plot... Fantaghiro (Alessandra Martines) is the youngest daughter of a king (Mario Adorf) who is perpetually at war with his neighbor. When the opposing king has the nerve to die, his son, Romualdo (Kim Rossi Stuart), decides to end the war.  Pity for him that the headstrong young princess has been taken in by the White Knight / White Witch to train her for a destiny bigger than anyone could expect.  She is a lass ahead of her time, with little interest in being a lady and balls bigger than most anyone in her father's court. A prophecy predicts the only hope of beating Romualdo would be if one of the kings children (three girls...the beautiful one, the smart one and the nutty one) could defeat him.  Steeling up and trained by not only a mystic knight and weird witch, but braced by her friend the talking goose(!), the animate rock (!!) and the grabby tree that is very nice but had me thinking of The Evil Dead (!!!) Fantaghiro goes in to the breach.  Of course, Romualdo sees her before the classic kung fu movie trope of "is he a man or is she a woman" is played and the pair fall in love.  Cleverly, he sees only her eyes and looks all around for her and is haunted by a vision of the lovely face in his swords reflection.  When he challenges Fantaghiro, posing as a duke, to go into danger against a monster (in the English titles Cave of the Golden Rose) the romance heats up.

Now, this is 3 hours long so I'm skimping, but there is lots of humor, good smatterings of adventuring and a monsters "cave" that would probably scare the underoos of unsuspecting kids.  This scene alone probably has created the fandom and sequels-it is all very effective.  Lamberto Bava really shows off his skills here, creating big scenes and keeping the pace fast at nearly 200 minutes.  Most impressive to me is that he creates a fantasy world with ease, using lush castles and settings in the Czech Republic and Slovakia that are just stunning and lend a real air of the tangible to the fantastic animatronic elements.  I've noticed this is one of Bava's greatest skills, be it for large scale productions such as this, or shooting using natural light in weird castles for a small television horror films like The Ogre or Dinner With The Vampire.  The director has copped to enjoying the fantastic more than the horrific, and this production shows that given the chance he would show off all his skills--recognizable from the wild color patterns and low angle shots from a giallo, yet somehow properly applied to give dynamic life to a kingdom where even rocks can talk, with a New Yawk accent to boot!

The cast is fantastic, and even some pedestrian dubbing, though nowhere near as awful as Caraibi, can hamper the performance of Martines as the wild child princess.  From her very first appearance she shines and easily carries the film. Mario Adorf is having fun fretting and glowering as his daughters vex him.  And I can't say that Kim Rossi Stuart wowed me in Karate Warrior 1 and 2, but he looks like he fell out of a book of fairy tales and plays the smitten Romualdo without going overboard and trying to act in a kids film as happens so often.  

The score by Amedeo Minghi, who would work with Lamberto Bava on his fantasy shows, is apparently much beloved and commands high prices on the collectors market. There is a CD release that contains the scores for the Bava series group that I must have!

Everything works in this production, while it may not appeal to everyone (hey, I must admit to being ready to watch a good trashy giallo between each installment of Fantaghiro!), fans of Lamberto Bava should really check it out.  The Italian DVDs are a bit mixed. Volume 1 and 2 contain English audio, while 3 does not. I recently picked up series 4 and it also contains English, but no luck with 5!  Luckily, there is a fansubbing community out there, I need to attempt to get subs for these if possible.

You can learn more about Fantaghiro by taking a read through the original folk story it was based loosely on, Fanta-Ghiro, The Beautiful, by reading it here!

While I love Demons and his horror films, to truly get a grasp on Lamberto Bava and his film career, these shows are a must!  Seeing the name BAVA on a cartoon series (you can watch a few episodes of the remarakably well done and true to the television show animated Fantaghiro here)...well, that is priceless!

This is the first part of Fantaghiro in the English language export version, CAVE OF THE GOLDEN ROSE. Click through the viewer and you can watch the entire series, in English from the same user!