Bruno Mattei

Bruno Mattei 30 July 1931 21 May 2007 was an Italian film director screenwriter and editor who directed exploitation films in many genres including women in prison nunsploitation zombie mondo cannibal and Nazisploitation films Born in 1931 Bruno Mattei grew up in Rome Italy where his father owned a small film editing studio Mattei made his debut as a director with the drama Armida il dramma di una sposa1970 under the alias Jordon B Matthews He eventually had more pseudonyms than any working director in the world He returned to editing before making another comeback in 1976 with two lowbudget Nazi exploitation films Womens Camp 119 1977 aka Womens Camp 119 and Casa privata per le SS 1977 aka SS Girls Mattei followed these taboobreaking films with excursions into porno films and mondo shockumentaries all directed under his many pseudonyms concentrating on shock value with films such as Mondo erotico 1973 Libiodomania and Libidomania 2 Always on the lookout for new exploitation avenues Mattei followed with nunsploitation with the softcore sex film La vera storia della monaca di Monza 1980 and the violent sex thriller The Other Hell 1981 Both films involved a partnership with writerdirector Claudio Fragasso who helped him write and direct the backtoback productions Using yet another alias Vincent Dawn Mattei directed Hell of the Living Dead 1980 aka Hell of the Living Dead a lowbudged zombie picture inspired by other zombie cannibal movies such as Dawn of the Dead 1978 and Lucio Fulcis Zombi 2 1979 Virus was filmed in Spain and used jungle footage from New Guinea and a patch soundtrack from Goblins Dawn of the Dead soundtrack which was a minor hit in Italy and abroad After directing two womens prison films starring Laura Gemser Mattei moved to directing swordandsorcery flicks starting with I sette magnifici gladiatori 1983 Both Mattei and Fragasso collaborated on the scifihorror flick Rats Notte di terrore 1984 inspired by the futuristic movies of the early 1980s Mattei considers this his best work despite his still having to work with a very low budget He worked relentlessly through the 1980s directing a pair of spaghetti westerns some action flicks and about half of Zombi 3 1988 after Lucio Fulci was taken off the production though Mattei was not credited with it In the early 1990s Mattei directed a series of erotic thrillers and a madeforTV movie Cruel Jaws 1995 TV which was inspired by Steven Spielbergs Jaws 1975 Mattei continued making films with more than 50 to his credit by the 200s In early 2007 his health becan to decline rapidly after he was diagnosed with a brain tumor Despite his doctors warnings he went through with a surgical operation to have the tumor removed in May of that year After the surgery he fell into a coma from complications and died a few days later on May 21 2007 at age 75