Great retro song, beautiful retro video!

Well, let it not be said that there's little value to the new "Get Smart" movie... In it, I recognized a song I've been trying to identify for years, imdb'ed it, and found it's called "Anna (El Negro Zumbon)".

This song is in a beautiful snippet from the breathtakingly lyrical 1988 film "Cinema Paradiso," and I could never track down before now what it was or who was the actress... But here's the original! (I love the smoky high-key lighting in it!) Enjoy!!



So, thanks to "Get Smart," I've just learned the actress was Silvana Mangano in the 1951 film "Anna," which, according to "The Foreign Film Theme" page, was "one of the earliest foreign films to enjoy much success in the U.S.--due in large part to Magnano's sensuality and the more open treatment of sexuality than accepted in contemporary American films. Magnano plays a nun who meets two former lovers when one shoots the other in her hospital. She flashes back to her life as a dancer in a smoky nightclub while nursing one back to health, but decides to stick with the spiritual life."

(I don't understand the Spanish lyrics, but they seem to be about a Brazilian dance...)

Some trivia from what seems to be the closest things to an official "Anna (El Negro Zumbon)" page:
  • Original: 1951 Silvana Mangano (dubbed by Flo Sandon's) in Italian film "Anna" (director Alberto Lattuada)

  • First guitar instrumental of Anna was recorded by Chet Atkins in 1957.

  • Danish guitarist Jørgen Ingmann scored in 1961 a hit (#54 Billboard) with Anna on the Atco label as follow-up for Apache.

  • A very interesting Indo-Rock version was recorded live from The Twangies (with lead-guitarist Frits Galistan) at the Astoria in Freiburg, Germany in the Summer of 1963.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

How marvelous! Have to watch the whole movie now.