Italian Thrilling Spectacle Between Aesthetics, Enthusiasm and Nostalgia

Abstract This study focuses on the reflection of popular genres from Italian cinema during the 1960’s to 1980’s in Czecho(Slovakian) film and non film press during the years 1990 to 2000. The subject for analysis will only be comprehensive and compact texts that deal with concrete popular genres or with the productions of filmmakers that represent various models of a thrilling spectacle. We will mention only one example from Czech and Slovak translations, because this study deals purely with original published Czech and Slovak texts. This study aims to emphasize the themes chosen by Czech and Slovak film publicists, critics, and journalists in relation to popular Italian genres and in what way they developed interpretative thinking and historical, socio-cultural and industrial context of various models of a thrilling spectacle. Part of our study examines the point of view of film journalism in Czecho(Slovak) periodical press, in the sense of a historical document about period thinking on popular genres of Italian cinema, it will also take into account the enthusiastic and nostalgic approach taken by some of the authors that became a parallel line to the aesthetic interpretation of the films. The study will also touch on social, cultural and medial transformations after the year 1989 which led in Czecho(Slovak) film journalism to a greater critical interest in Italian popular genres. The text will be divided into two parts. The first part will deal only with the Italian western that belonged to the most often reflected and analyzed categories of spectacular spectacle. The second part will point to other lines of thrilling spectacle in Italian popular cinema and to some filmmakers whose work was repeatedly reflected in film journalism.