Bruno Mattei 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.
15 Facts About Bruno Mattei
1.
2.
Bruno Mattei continued work as a director primarily in the Philippines until his death in 2007, just before he was to enter production on his fifth Zombie film.
3.
Bruno Mattei was born on 30 July 1931 in Rome, Italy.
4.
Bruno Mattei grew up around films as his father owned a film editing studio.
5.
Bruno Mattei studied at the Centro Sperimentale Centrale, the national film school, and graduated in 1951.
6.
Bruno Mattei initially worked as a screenwriter and claimed to have worked on over 100 films as an editor, a claim that film historian Louis Paul stated was "difficult to verify".
7.
Some earliest films Bruno Mattei worked on included Lulu and Tua per la vita.
8.
Early film work started in 1956 on Giovanni dalle Bande Nere, after which Bruno Mattei worked on several peplum and Eurospy films.
9.
In 1982, Bruno Mattei filmed two "women in prison" films, Women's Prison Massacre and Violence in a Women's Prison.
10.
In 1980, Bruno Mattei began collaborating with screenwriter Claudio Fragasso, beginning with The True Story of the Nun of Monza and ending with a comedy called Three For One.
11.
Bruno Mattei was initially attached to direct an adaptation of Hercules from a screenplay by Ricardo Ghione.
12.
Bruno Mattei later directed Lou Ferrigno in The Seven Magnificent Gladiators.
13.
Bruno Mattei replaced Lucio Fulci as the director of Zombi 3 in the Philippines after Fulci left the project unfinished, then co-produced Zombie 4: After Death immediately afterwards with Fragasso in the director's chair, using the same sets and some of the same cast members.
14.
From 1993 onward, Bruno Mattei worked as a director almost exclusively for Italian producer Giovanni Paolucci, a working arrangement that jump-started Bruno Mattei's career after he and Fragasso had gone their own ways in 1990.
15.
Bruno Mattei died in Rome, Italy in a hospital after complications from brain tumor surgery on May 21,2007, at age 75.