Cirrus@Austlit

The film 'covers the interaction between staff and patients of a mental institution when they are accidentally locked in an underground bunker after the start of atomic warfare.'

Source: Australian Screen (http://aso.gov.au/people/Giorgio_Mangiamele/portrait/). (Sighted: 29/9/2014)

Ninety-Nine Per Cent is Giorgio Mangiamele's only comedy. Gaetano Rando says of the film that it is 'to some extent based on a narrative style that recalls Pirandellian umorismo (Lampugnani 2006) but also contains significant elements of slapstick humour. It tells the story of Pino, a short and fat Italian widower, who decides to remarry when the principal of his son's school accuses him of not being able to look after his son properly. Given the scarcity of women willing to marry Italian migrants--a theme elaborated in the Italian comic film Bello onesto emigrato in Australia sposerebbe compaesana illibata (Zampa, 1971) [. . .] and, later, in Love's Brother (Sardi, 2004)--Pino resorts to a matrimonial agency and is assured by the manager that he has a 99 per cent chance of making it with a beautiful tall blonde. When he calls on the lady in question, she cruelly derides him. The likeable protagonist is left only with his son to console him' (Rando, 'Liminality' pp. 213-214).

The third of Giorgio Mangiamele's films about migrant experiences, the narrative tells of an Italian paperboy who is bullied and taunted by three bodgies because of his race/background. In a chase, the boy is hit by a drunk driver and dies on the kerbside. His papers scatter and blow away. His mother sees paper flying in the air outside her window and has a premonition of tragedy.

A film made independently by Giorgio Mangiamele, eighteen months after his arrival in Australia. Starring people Mangiamele had met on the boat to Australia, who also crewed the film, it was made with a view to post-production dubbing into Italian and, money permitting, English, but Mangiamele was never able to afford post-production work.

The film follows Italian migrants, newly arrived in Australia and desperately seeking work to pay off their debts.

Source:

Turnour, Quentin. 'Giorgio', Senses of Cinema 14 (2001).