Heads or Tails? is an Italian western directed by Alessio Rigo de Righi and Matteo Zoppis, set in the early 1900s when Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show came to Rome selling the legend of the frontier, with blank-firing rifles and cowboy shows, to Italians.
“We wanted to make an Italian Western that was actually set in Italy,” explain the directors. “Many of the so-called spaghetti westerns shot in Italy were actually set in the United States, often on the Mexican border. We were interested in telling something authentically Italian”.
The film was shot in natural landscapes that met the demands of a "Western" setting in Lazio. Locations included Sabaudia, San Felice, and the Circeo National Park; Pantani d’Inferno, Grotta delle Capre, lake Caprolace and lake Fogliano, Cerasella, and the Verdesca pool. “We shot in the summer when there was little water in the marshes, so we had to recreate them”, the directors explain.
Filming also took place in the city of Rome, with an almost unrecognizable piazzale Clodio providing the setting for the contest.
Mountain scenes were filmed in Massa Carrara, Tuscany, and in Liguria, in the Pantanello Natural Park.
Heads or Tails? is an Italian western directed by Alessio Rigo de Righi and Matteo Zoppis, set in the early 1900s when Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show came to Rome selling the legend of the frontier, with blank-firing rifles and cowboy shows, to Italians.
“We wanted to make an Italian Western that was actually set in Italy,” explain the directors. “Many of the so-called spaghetti westerns shot in Italy were actually set in the United States, often on the Mexican border. We were interested in telling something authentically Italian”.
The film was shot in natural landscapes that met the demands of a "Western" setting in Lazio. Locations included Sabaudia, San Felice, and the Circeo National Park; Pantani d’Inferno, Grotta delle Capre, lake Caprolace and lake Fogliano, Cerasella, and the Verdesca pool. “We shot in the summer when there was little water in the marshes, so we had to recreate them”, the directors explain.
Filming also took place in the city of Rome, with an almost unrecognizable piazzale Clodio providing the setting for the contest.
Mountain scenes were filmed in Massa Carrara, Tuscany, and in Liguria, in the Pantanello Natural Park.
Andromeda Film, Cinema Inutile, Cinemaundici, Ring Film
Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show came to Rome in the early 1900s, selling the legend of the frontier to Italians, with blank rifles and cowboy spectacles. Against the backdrop of a legendary contest between American and Italian cowboys, Rosa, wife of the local squire, falls in love with the winner Santino. Following her husband's murder, Rosa and Santino flee together, but justice, as always, is sold to the highest bidder, and a large price is placed on Santino's head. With Buffalo Bill hot on their trail, Rosa dreams of America—the real country, not the version advertised on posters with buffalo—but these dreams come up against reality. As in every self-respecting Western ballad, fate tosses the coin, and often, truth remains buried underground.
