Indian Summer (1972) La prima notte di quiete (original title)

Director:

Valerio Zurlini

Writers:

Enrico Medioli
Valerio Zurlini (story)
(more)

Release Date:

November 1978 (USA)

Genre:

Drama

Plot:

In Italy, the gambler and professor of poetry Daniele Dominici arrives in the seaside town of Rimini...

Plot Keywords:

Poetry | Social Change | Secret | Philosophy | Teacher Student Relationship

Cast

Alain Delon	...	Daniele Dominici
Giancarlo Giannini	...	Giorgio Mosca aka 'Spider'
Sonia Petrovna	...	Vanina Abati (as Sonia Petrova)
Renato Salvatori	...	Marcello
Alida Valli	...	Marcella Abati - Vanina's mother
Adalberto Maria Merli	...	Gerardo Favani
Nicoletta Rizzi	...	Elvira
Salvo Randone	...	The Head Teacher
Lea Massari	...	Monica
Fabrizio Moroni	...	Fabrizio Romani - student
Patrizia Adiutori	...	Valeria
Sandro Moretti	...	Leo Montanari
Carla Mancini	...	Female Student
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Julia Dancourt	...	Voice of Monica (voice) (uncredited)
Liana Del Balzo	...	Signora Dominici, Daniele's mother (uncredited)
Roberto Lande	...	(uncredited)
Krista Nell	...	Martine - the girl reading Daniele's palm (uncredited)
Maria Tedeschi	...	The Bespectacled Lady at the Funeral (uncredited)

Directed by
Valerio Zurlini

Writing credits (in alphabetical order)
Enrico Medioli
Valerio Zurlini		story
Valerio Zurlini

Original Music by
Mario Nascimbene

Cinematography by
Dario Di Palma

Film Editing by
Mario Morra

Production Design by
Camillo Teti

Set Decoration by
Franco Gambarana

Costume Design by
Luca Sabatelli

Makeup Department
Gabriella Borzelli	....	hair stylist
Amato Garbini	....	makeup artist

Production Management
Gilberto Scarpellini	....	unit manager
Averoe Stefani	....	production supervisor
Camillo Teti	....	production manager

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Paolo Pietrangeli	....	assistant director

Sound Department
Alberto Bartolomei	....	sound mixer
Danilo Moroni	....	sound mixer
Bruno Zanoli	....	sound

Camera and Electrical Department
Umberto Dessena	....	grip
Blasco Giurato	....	camera operator

Editorial Department
Piera Gabutti	....	assistant editor
Massimo Quaglia	....	assistant editor

Music Department
Gianni Basso	....	musician: saxofone solos
Maynard Ferguson	....	musician: trumpet soloist

Other crew
Franca Invernizzi	....	script girl
Enzo Lucarini	....	administrator (as Vincenzo Lucarini)

Production Companies

• Mondial Televisione Film
• Adel Productions (co-production)
• Valoria Films (co-production)

Distributors

• Valoria Films (1972) (France) (theatrical)
• Pathé (2003) (France) (all media)
• Fox Pathé Europa (2003) (France) (DVD)
• Analysis Film Releasing Corporation (1978) (USA) (theatrical) (subtitled)
• Titanus Distribuzione (1972) (France) (theatrical)
• Titanus Distribuzione (1974) (Portugal) (theatrical)
• Aquarius TV (2001) (Greece) (DVD)
• Aquarius TV (2001) (Greece) (TV)
• Aquarius TV (2004) (Greece) (DVD)
• Sagres Filmes (Brazil) (VHS)
• Versátil Home Vídeo (2007) (Brazil) (DVD) (Portuguese subtitles)

Also Known As:

"La prima notte di quiete" - Italy (original title)
"The Professor" - USA (festival title)

Runtime:

Hungary:105 min | France:105 min | West Germany:90 min | Argentina:125 min | 130 min (director's cut)

Country:

Italy | France

Language:

Italian

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Argentina:16 | Portugal:17 (cut) | West Germany:18 | Portugal:M/12 (film festival rating) | Italy:VM14 | Finland:K-16

Filming Locations:

Rimini, Emilia-Romagna, Italy

Company:

Mondial Televisione Film

Soundtrack:

Che vuole questa musica stasera

Alain Delon and Giancarlo Giannini at their best in a fantastically photographed forgotten masterpiece

This is forgotten Italian master Valerio Zurlini's third best film after "Family Diary" and "Le Soldattese." It features one of Alain Delon's very best performances and an equally good supporting one from Giancarlo Giannini. Delon plays a hard-drinking and gambling professor of poetry who is fascinated by the sullenness of a beautiful student(Sonia Petrovna) and gradually falls in love with her. He finds out through his gambling buddies that she is involved in a pornography-prostitution operation of some kind. Zurlini's great film uses a slightly over-the-top melodramatic style to delve deep into the existentialist despair of Delon's character as he hangs around the discos of a very liberal and swinging early '70s post-sexual-revolution Italy, depressed by all the empty people around him desperately trying to distract themselves any way they can. The underlying Antonioni-like theme of people trying to distract themselves and merge into a crowd rather than individuate and painfully grow is very similar to that of "Desert of the Tartars," a film that couldn't be more different than "The Professor" on the surface. Dario Di Palma's deep-focus color cinematography in this film is one of the most breathtakingly gorgeous displays of virtuosity this side of Carlo Di Palma's soft-focus work in Antonioni's "Red Desert."