Satanik (film)


Satanik is a 1968 film directed by Piero Vivarelli. It is based on the Italian comic series Satanik and was released to a moderate financial success in Italy.

Cast

Satanik was filmed in 1967 shortly after Piero Vivarelli's film Avenger X was released. The film is credits state that the film was scripted by Eduardo Manzanos Brochero. Despite being based on the character from the Satanik comics, the film ignores most of the stories and characters and only keeps Marny Bannister's transformation from an old woman to a slim young woman from the original stories.

Release

Satanik was released in Italy in 1968. Film critic and historian Roberto Curti described the box office as being "moderately successful" in Italy.
The film was released on DVD by Retromedia and also part of Image Entertainment's "Euro Fiends from Beyond the Grave" compilation along with The Faceless Monster and The Red Headed Corpse.

Reception

From retrospective reviews, Roberto Curti noted the film was "perhaps the most disappointing of the flicks based on the fumetti neri phenomenon." Curti found the film to be poorly scripted and paced and criticized the weak acting performance by Magda Konopka.
Future film director Pupi Avati was an assistant director on the film for its scenes shot in Italy. Avati later commented his experience on the set stating that watching Vivarelli taught him how to not direct a film.

Footnotes