The Delights of the Shoot (1910)

Director:

Cast: André Deed

Synopsis: Cretinetti goes hunting with his friends.

Italian silent comic Cretinetti (Andre Deed) goes hunting with a friend and his wife – with whom our hero seems to be having a little fling in The Delights of the Shoot (Le delizie della caccia).  The illicit couple go out of their way to make the poor husband’s life a misery, shooting him in the backside, pushing him into a river and through a fence, and then finally pushing a haystack over him while he’s smoking a pipe. You could say things have come full circle, given modern movies’ propensity for making heroes out of bad guys who aren’t quite as bad as the real bad guys.  Primitive slapstick with exaggerated gestures and little in the way of laughs, but The Delights of the Shoot is worth a look for a glimpse of one of Italy’s biggest comedians at the time this was made.

(Reviewed 9th March 2012)