Scipio Africanus: The Defeat of Hannibal

Scipio Africanus: The Defeat of Hannibal (1937)

Scipione l'africano

Facist Italy's 1937 Spectacular Epic

A story of the Second Punic Wars, beginning with Scipio's futile pleas to the Roman Senate to build an army to battle Hannibal, that climaxes with the battle of Zama.

Date of release
1937-08-04
TMDB
5.6 / 10 (25)
Runtime
1h 23m
Genres
War, Drama, History
Director
Carmine Gallone

Casting

Interesting facts

Scipio Africanus: The Defeat of Hannibal is a 1937 Italian historical propaganda film directed by Carmine Gallone about Scipio Africanus from the time of his election as proconsul until his defeat of Hannibal at the Battle of Zama. The film received financial backing from Benito Mussolini's dictatorship and its production was overseen by Vittorio Mussolini.

Production

Benito Mussolini sought to revive Italian cinema after it was hurt by multiple box-office failures in the 1920s. His son Vittorio Mussolini oversaw the production of the film. He refused to use miniatures and sets up to 175 feet were built by 500 workers.

The film was shot over the course of 232 days from 10 August 1936 to 29 March 1937, near Sabaudia with 12.6 million lira invested by the Italian government. 20 principal actors, 38 secondary actors, 44,425 extras, 26,671 crew members, 174,610 military personnel, 3,171 horses, and 50 elephants were used for the film. 500 camels for a three minute scene and 100 seaworthy galleys were used.

The scene depicting the Battle of Zama used 12,000 soldiers and 1,000 Libyan horsemen. Sixteen soldiers were injured during the filming of the battle. The soldiers were then transferred to duty in the Spanish Civil War. Tobis Film participated in the film's production and required that Hannibal's soldiers be Aryans.

On 10 June 1936, Giacomo Paulucci, president of ENIC, asked Ildebrando Pizzetti to compose the film's score. It was the first film that Pizzetti worked on although he was offered the role to compose Cabiria. The score was completed by spring 1937, and Pizzetti performed one of its songs before Benito Mussolini on 28 April in Cinecittà using the orchestra and chorus of the Teatro dell'Opera di Roma.

Carmine Gallone was selected to direct the film, but Italian officials criticized his failure to prevent historical inaccuracies in the film, including extras wearing watches and telephone wires in the background of the Battle of Zama. Gallone argued against cutting the scenes featuring the inaccuracies due to them being needed for continuity and the scenes remained in the film. Gallone, Camillo Mariani dell'Aguillara, S.A.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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