Hannibal (1959)

During the Second Punic War in 218 BC, Carthaginian general Hannibal attacks the Roman Republic by crossing the Pyrenees and the Alps with his vast army.

Directors:

Carlo Ludovico Bragaglia, Edgar G. Ulmer

Writers:

Mortimer Braus, Sandro Continenza (as Allesandro Continenza)

Stars:

Victor Mature, Gabriele Ferzetti, Rita Gam

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Victor Mature	...	Hannibal
Gabriele Ferzetti	...	Fabius Maximus
Rita Gam	...	Sylvia
Milly Vitale	...	Danila
Rik Battaglia	...	Hasdrubal
Franco Silva	...	Maharbal
Terence Hill	...	Quintilius (as Mario Girotti)
Mirko Ellis	...	Mago
Andrea Aureli	...	Gajus Terentius Varro
Andrea Fantasia	...	Konsul Paulus Emilius
Renzo Cesana	...	(as Renato Cesana)
Bud Spencer	...	Rutario (as Carlo Pedersoli)
Pina Bottin
Remo De Angelis
Piero Mitri

Storyline

After making his historic crossing of the Alps with elephants transporting supplies and troops, Hannibal marches on Rome in a war of revenge. During his advance, he captures Sylvia, the niece of Roman Senator Fabius Maximus but, instead of holding her prisoner, he shows her his powerful army and herds of elephants, then sets her free. He is sure she will report what she has seen to his Roman enemies. Hannibal defeats the Romans at the battle of Trebbia and sends a message to Sylvia that he is marching on Rome. Sylvia succumbs to her love of Hannibal and they have a rendezvous, but are surprised by a Roman patrol. Hannibal escapes and Sylvia is confined to the temple of the Vesta Goddess. She escapes and meets Hannibal again. Hannibal orders his brother Hasdrubal to Carthage to take over command of the reinforcements preparing to join Hannibal. Hannibals wife Danila arrives from Carthage unexpectedly and Sylvia runs away and returns to Rome, where she is tried for high treason and ...

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Plot Keywords:

character name as title | carthage | elephant | alps | army | 

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Taglines:

"What my elephants can't conquer, I'll conquer alone!"

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Biography | Drama | History | War

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Did You Know?

Trivia

Director Edgar G. Ulmer has said that Warner Bros., which released the picture in the US, had cut the film so badly that when he saw it in a theater he barely recognized it.

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Goofs

Towards the start of the film there is a panoramic shot of Rome. This shot includes many familiar buildings such as the Colosseum, which was not built until some 300 years after the events of the film.

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Alternate Versions

There were two different cuts of this movie in existence at the time of release. The version released originally in Italy and subsequently in Germany and maybe other non English speaking European countries had a running time of 95 minutes. The US release version is given with 103 minutes. The BBFC lists a submitted running time of 104m 40s.

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Connections

Referenced in Edgar G. Ulmer - The Man Off-screen (2004)

User Reviews

Just plain awful.

I don't know who the hell shot this, but I suppose I could glance at the credits and lay blame on the culprits, but since I'm lazy and irritated right now I'll just skip the formality and say that Victor Mature probably fired his agent several times over after being booked for this gig.

He is quite literally the only competent person thesping his role, all the while other actors are stiff, comical, and otherwise just plain unconvincing. But like I implied in my first paragraph, it's not even the acting (however bad by the supporting cast) that's the issue: It's the cinematography: It's the direction and shot set ups: It's poor scheduling of the extras so the most can be gotten out of them shot wise. It's everything from the awful costumes to the lack of historical accuracy, to the extreme lack of consistent production values.

The battle scenes are so poorly staged that you wonder who the hell was in charge of this thing. The acting, as mentioned, by all other than the lead (Mature) is some of the worst I've seen for a feature film. It's that bad.

Avoid this thing.

Details

Country:

Italy

Language:

Italian

Release Date:

18 June 1960 (USA)

Also Known As:

Hannibal

Filming Locations:

Avala Studios, Belgrade, Serbia

Box Office

Budget:

$4,000,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Liber Film

Technical Specs

Runtime:

100 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Sound)

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1