Hornets’ Nest [Il Vespaio] ** (1970, Rock Hudson, Sylva Koscina, Sergio Fantoni) – Classic Movie Review 9007

Director Phil Karlson’s 1970 Hornets’ Nest [Il Vespaio] stars Rock Hudson as sole surviving American paratrooper captain Turner, who leads the bunch of Italian orphans who have saved him in blowing up a crucial Nazi dam in Italy in 1944 in return for payback on the Nazis who massacred their village.

This so-so World War Two wartime action thriller with a soft pacifist message is fairly involving and slickly directed, but it went unnoticed at the time and did not help Hudson’s flagging movie career.

The now forgotten Sixties Yugoslav sexpot Sylva Koscina (replacing Sophia Loren) vamps shamelessly as a shapely German-sympathising fascist doctor called Bianca, who tends the wounded Turner.

Hornets’ Nest [Il Vespaio] is filmed in June 1969 in Italy at Gazzola, Provincia di Piacenza, Emilia-Romagna (Castello di Rivalta, Castello di Monticello).

Also in the cast are Sergio Fantoni, Jacques Sernas, Giacomo Rossi Stuart, Mark Colleano, Mauro Gravina, John Fordyce, Tom Felleghy [Tom Fellighi], Andrea Bosic, Gérard Herter, Goffredo Unger and Rod Dana.

Hornets’ Nest [Il Vespaio] is directed by Phil Karlson, runs 109 minutes, is made by Produzioni Associate Delphos and Triangle Productions, is released by United Artists, is written by S S Schweitzer, based on a story by S S Schweitzer and Stanley Colbert, is shot by Gábor Pogány, is produced by Stanley S Canter and is scored by Ennio Morricone, with Art Direction by Arrigo Equini.

Koscina had just starred in another World War Two movie, The Battle of Neretva (1969), filmed in her Yugoslav home country.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 9007

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