The Transporter (1950 film)

The Transporter
The Transporter
Directed by	Giorgio Simonelli
Written by	Pietro Garinei ; Sandro Giovannini ; Dino Maiuri ; Mario Amendola ; Ruggero Maccari ; Vittorio Metz
Produced by	Antonio Altoviti ; Raffaele Colamonici ; Umberto Montesi
Starring	Peppino De Filippo ; Silvana Pampanini ; Lída Baarová ; Aroldo Tieri
Cinematography	Sergio Pesce
Edited by	Giuseppe Vari
Music by	Gino Filippini
Production; company	C.M. Produzione Film
Distributed by	Regionale
Release date	4 November 1950;
Country	Italy
Language	Italian

The Transporter (Italian: La bisarca) is a 1950 Italian comedy science fiction film directed by Giorgio Simonelli and starring Peppino De Filippo, Silvana Pampanini, Lída Baarová and Aroldo Tieri.^[1] It is based on a radio program with the same name.^[2]^[3]

It was shot at the Farnesina Studios in Rome. The film's sets were designed by the art director Alberto Boccianti. It earned 182 and a half million lira at the Italian box office.^[4]

Synopsis

A barber is engaged to a manicurist working in the shop, but he grows jealous and picks a quarrel with one of the customers. Struck on the head he crashes into a radio playing a serial programme. Knocked unconscious he begins to have bizarre dreams about a deluge and a car transporter which functions as a Noah's Ark.

Production

The film was based on the homonymous radio broadcast by Pietro Garinei and Sandro Giovannini, broadcast for two seasons from 1949 to 1951. A theatrical magazine was also taken from the radio broadcast, staged for the first time at the Sistina Theater in Rome. The film was shot in the Titanus studios at the Farnesina.

Cast

Peppino De Filippo as Toni La Motta
Lída Baarová as Greta
Clelia Matania as Dolores Garcia
Silvana Pampanini as Mirella
Aroldo Tieri as Alberto
Carlo Campanini as Salvador Garcia
Enrico Viarisio as Georges Durand
Kay Medford as Anna Paperiska
Maria Donati as Georges Durand's Wife
Riccardo Billi as Noè
Franco Coop as Otto Krüger
Paul Muller as Complice di Anna Paperiska
Galeazzo Benti as Cliente galante
Tino Buazzelli as Dimitri
Arturo Bragaglia as Mayor
Virgilio Riento as Capo della banda di Arcachon
Vittorio Sanipoli as Johnny
Nietta Zocchi as Cliente di La Motta
Bruno Corelli
Mario Siletti
Giulio Donnini
Franco Pesce

References

^ Gundle p.270
^ Roberto Chiti; Roberto Poppi; Enrico Lancia. Dizionario del cinema italiano: I film. Gremese, 1991. ISBN 8876055487.
^ Paolo Mereghetti. Il Mereghetti. B.C. Dalai Editore, 2010. ISBN 8860736269.
^ Chiti & Poppi p.63

Bibliography

Chiti, Roberto & Poppi, Roberto. Dizionario del cinema italiano: Dal 1945 al 1959. Gremese Editore, 1991.
Gundle, Stephen. Fame Amid the Ruins: Italian Film Stardom in the Age of Neorealism. Berghahn Books, 2019.