Avanti. Carlo Rustichelli
Baltimore industrialist Wendell Armbruster (Jack Lemmon) crosses paths with London shop girl Pamela Piggott (Juliet Mills) when they come to Ischia to pick up the bodies of her mother and his father, who have been killed in an automobile accident after a ten-year summertime affair. Straitlaced Wendell tries to avoid a scandal while free-spirited Pamela is impressed by the romantic setting. After some confusion with the bodies and a blackmail attempt by unscrupulous locals, Wendell and Pamela extend their parent's affair into the next generation. This lovely soundtrack nails that 60's-foreign-Hollywood thing perfectly. Carlo Rustichelli came up with a delightful song-adaptation score, with his thematic use of such Italian standards as "Senza Fine", composed by Gino Paoli. Rustichelli's swooning orchestra mixes with every rustic Mediterranean instrument (mandolin, accordion, harmonica...) you'd expect to hear from the an island off Naples, making AVANTI! a charming cross-pollination between a very Italian approach to romance, and the lush Hollywood needs of its English-speaking stars in a lovers' paradise, Ischia.
Baltimore industrialist Wendell Armbruster (Jack Lemmon) crosses paths with London shop girl Pamela Piggott (Juliet Mills) when they come to Ischia to pick up the bodies of her mother and his father, who have been killed in an automobile accident after a ten-year summertime affair. Straitlaced Wendell tries to avoid a scandal while free-spirited Pamela is impressed by the romantic setting. After some confusion with the bodies and a blackmail attempt by unscrupulous locals, Wendell and Pamela extend their parent's affair into the next generation. This lovely soundtrack nails that 60's-foreign-Hollywood thing perfectly. Carlo Rustichelli came up with a delightful song-adaptation score, with his thematic use of such Italian standards as "Senza Fine", composed by Gino Paoli. Rustichelli's swooning orchestra mixes with every rustic Mediterranean instrument (mandolin, accordion, harmonica...) you'd expect to hear from the an island off Naples, making AVANTI! a charming cross-pollination between a very Italian approach to romance, and the lush Hollywood needs of its English-speaking stars in a lovers' paradise, Ischia.