Serious Italian films from this period are difficult to find on the ground. What mostly survives are the bone-breaking comedies that make Keystone slapstick look like drawing room comedies and, of course, the epics. It is the epics that pieces like this one-reel drama evolved into within a couple of years. There are three big set-pieces, one in which the schoolboy dreams of running off to join Garibaldi's campaign to unify Italy; the second is the battle scene -- naturally! -- which is stagy and unrealistically acted to the modern eye; and the capper.
Technically, this is a fine piece, both for the stencilled color effects and the double exposures. The modern viewer, used to computer generated images and camera cranes that can swing through arcs of fifty meters without a thought, forgets what can be done by craftsmen in the camera. But although of great technical and historical interest, the primitive screen acting makes this one largely a curiosity to the modern eye.
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