Ausonia in Il principino saltimbanco (1914)
Vintage Italian postcard. Mario Guaita - Ausonia on crutches in Il principino saltimbanco (Giovanni Enrico Vidali, Società Italiana Eclair 1914). 'Grandioso Dramma in cinque parti' (Grand Drama in five parts). The man right of Ausonia is director Giovanni Enrico Vidali himself who also acted in the film, while the the two on the left could be Emilia Vidali and Carlo Vidali.
Plot: A louche aristocrat forces the widowed princess De Filard into mariage by abducting her son and hides him with farmers. The farmers sell the boy to a wandering acrobat and so the boy's nomadic life starts. He is forces to perform as athlete together with the acrobat's little daughter, who dances. Years go by, the children grow up and fall in love with each other. In the end the young man is reunited with his mother, who has never stopped looking for him. The found mother blesses the matrimony of the two young lovers.
Il principino saltimbanco was shot in 1914 and premiered in January 1915. The main actors in addition to Ausonia were Enrico Vidali, Maria Gandini, Emilia Vidali and Carlo Vidali. The film was clearly a popular success. The Turinese film journal La Vita cinematografica recognized this, but criticized the illogic plot and the audience's tears over the melodrama. Yet, the journal praised the performance of (Enrico) Vidali, Gandini, and Ausonia. About the latter the critic wrote that even if he was perhaps not a real film actor, his restraint and naturalness should be the envy of many other actors.
Athletic muscleman Mario Guaita aka Ausonia (1881-1956) was an Italian actor, director, producer and scriptwriter in the silent era. He had his international breakthrough with Spartaco (Enrico Vidali 1913) and became a major actor in the Italian forzuto genre. In the early 1920s he moved to Marseille, made a few films there such as Mes p'tits and La course à l'amour, and ran a cinema.
Ausonia in Il principino saltimbanco (1914)
Vintage Italian postcard. Mario Guaita - Ausonia on crutches in Il principino saltimbanco (Giovanni Enrico Vidali, Società Italiana Eclair 1914). 'Grandioso Dramma in cinque parti' (Grand Drama in five parts). The man right of Ausonia is director Giovanni Enrico Vidali himself who also acted in the film, while the the two on the left could be Emilia Vidali and Carlo Vidali.
Plot: A louche aristocrat forces the widowed princess De Filard into mariage by abducting her son and hides him with farmers. The farmers sell the boy to a wandering acrobat and so the boy's nomadic life starts. He is forces to perform as athlete together with the acrobat's little daughter, who dances. Years go by, the children grow up and fall in love with each other. In the end the young man is reunited with his mother, who has never stopped looking for him. The found mother blesses the matrimony of the two young lovers.
Il principino saltimbanco was shot in 1914 and premiered in January 1915. The main actors in addition to Ausonia were Enrico Vidali, Maria Gandini, Emilia Vidali and Carlo Vidali. The film was clearly a popular success. The Turinese film journal La Vita cinematografica recognized this, but criticized the illogic plot and the audience's tears over the melodrama. Yet, the journal praised the performance of (Enrico) Vidali, Gandini, and Ausonia. About the latter the critic wrote that even if he was perhaps not a real film actor, his restraint and naturalness should be the envy of many other actors.
Athletic muscleman Mario Guaita aka Ausonia (1881-1956) was an Italian actor, director, producer and scriptwriter in the silent era. He had his international breakthrough with Spartaco (Enrico Vidali 1913) and became a major actor in the Italian forzuto genre. In the early 1920s he moved to Marseille, made a few films there such as Mes p'tits and La course à l'amour, and ran a cinema.