Macaroni Combat, also known as Macaroni War or Euro War films, is a nickname for a broad sub-genre of war film that emerged in the mid-1960s, so named because most were produced and directed by European co-productions notably Italians.[1]
The typical team was made up of an Italian director, Italo-Spanish technical staff, and a cast of Italian and Spanish actors and sometimes German and French, sometimes a fading Hollywood star. The films were primarily shot in Europe and later, the Philippines.
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Much like the Italy's own spaghetti westerns, the Macaroni Combat film mimicked the success of American films such as The Dirty Dozen and Where Eagles Dare. Like spaghetti westerns, Euro War films were characterized by their production in the Italian language, low budgets, added violence, and a recognizable highly fluid and minimalist cinematography. This was partly intentional and partly the context and cultural background of the filmmakers. Throughout the '60s and '70s the films were almost all set during World War II. In the 1960s and 1970s some films were made about mercenaries in Africa following the success of Dark of the Sun, and some filmed in the 1980s would be set during the Vietnam War following the success of Platoon.[1]
The best-known and perhaps archetypal Macaroni Combat film is probably The Inglorious Bastards directed by Enzo G. Castellari. Its present status is mostly due to Quentin Tarantino's 2009 film Inglourious Basterds, an American produced film inspired by the genre.
In decades past, far and away the best known of the Italian-made World War II films were Anzio (1968) and Hornet's Nest (1970) with their A-list cast members.
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