Laggiù nella giungla (1986)

Director:

Stefano Reali

Writers:

Pino Quartullo (writer)
Stefano Reali (writer)

Cast

  (Credited cast)

Robert Powell
Tony Vogel
Andréa Ferréol
Renato Scarpa
Pasquale Anselmo
Marilda Donà
Anna Galiena
Luis Alberto Mena
Gianfranco Tondini
Egidio Termine
Van Johnson
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Eva Blanco
Maria Bosco
Tullio Cavalli
Jaime Orlando Daza

Also Known As:

Down There in the Jungle (USA)

Runtime:

109 min

Country:

Italy

Language:

Italian

Color:

Color

Company:

Karol Film

Delightfully surreal.

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I came across this little masterpiece on TV, late one night, by pure chance. No-one seems to have ever heard of it here in Italy. The plot is quite simple, during a bus ride in the Italian countryside a group of nine people get stranded along the highway (the bus has to stop because of a blown tyre and then departs without them). Their journey back to some inhabited place slowly becomes a magical adventure, where tamed woods become wild jungles and nothing is what it seems. The characters themselves, quiet, common people at the beginning, undergo a transformation that makes them very similar to those dark, cynical, mysterious characters in Hollywood 40es dramas set in Africa or Asia. Even their demeanor and their voices change, they all seem to have some dark secret in their past, all their good qualities and faults come out sharp, heroes and villains, coward husbands and misbehaving wives. They all have to come to terms with their past but at the end of the journey they will all be stronger, better persons. I strongly recommend it.