Luigi Cozzi
Cozzi in 2011.
Born	(1947-09-07) September 7, 1947 (age 64) Busto Arsizio, Italy
Occupation	Film director, screenwriter

Luigi Cozzi (born September 7, 1947) is an Italian movie director and screenwriter who directed mainly science fiction and horror films in the mid-1970s and throughout the 1980s. He was born in 1947 in Busto Arsizio, Italy.

Biography[link]

Cozzi has been interested in film making since his teen years, producing a low budget science fiction film at age 21 called The Tunnel Under the World^[1], which brought him to the attention of producer Dario Argento. Cozzi worked as an assistant director and screenwriter on a number of Argento's most famous movies, even directing a made-for-TV movie called The Neighbor for the "Doorway To Darkness" television series produced by Argento in 1973.

Cozzi's first professional film was a 1975 giallo he made called The Killer Must Kill Again after which he was hired to direct a number of bigger budget science fiction and fantasy films, such as Contamination, Starcrash^[2], Hercules and Hercules 2. Cozzi worked with a lot of well-known genre actors such as Caroline Munro, Sybil Danning, Lou Ferrigno, Joe Spinnell, Klaus Kinski, and Brett Halsey.

In 1986, he wrote and planned to direct Sinbad of the Seven Seas, but the producer replaced him at the last minute with director Enzo Castellari. Castellari changed Cozzi's script drastically and several million dollars later, wound up submitting three hours of non-releasable footage to the producer, who shelved the project. In 1989, Cozzi was hired back to come in and fix up the picture, the producer spending an additional half million dollars finishing it.

Cozzi wrote a script he called De Profundis, which was supposed to be an unauthorized finale to Dario Argento's unfinished "Three Mothers" Trilogy (begun in his films Suspiria and Inferno). Cozzi shot the film as "De Profundis" (which means "From the Deep") starring Caroline Munro, but the American distributors (who at that time were planning a series of Edgar Allan Poe films) changed the title of Cozzi's film to "The Black Cat" at the last minute, although the film had no connection to Poe. Their Poe film series, however, never materialized. Cozzi's retitled film received very poor (if any) distribution, and does not seem to have ever been released on video. Cozzi later discovered that director Lucio Fulci had expressed an interest in directing his screenplay, without realizing that Cozzi had already directed the film himself. (It's probably just as well, since Fulci had already directed a film called The Black Cat back in 1981.

Cozzi also worked on the special effects in Dario Argento's Phenomena, and was an assistant director on The Stendahl Syndrome, Two Evil Eyes and Nosferatu in Venice (a sequel to Nosferatu the Vampyre which gave him the chance to work with Klaus Kinski). When Mario Caiano (the director on Nosferatu in Venice) quit the picture unexpectedly, Kinski attempted to finish directing it himself, and the producer brought Cozzi in to help Kinski co-direct it. The film did very poorly, mainly because Kinski refused to wear the Nosferatu make-up he wore in the earlier film. Cozzi also co-wrote the screenplays for Four Flies on Grey Velvet and Lamberto Bava's Jaws knock-off Monster Shark. Some of his work was done under his Americanized stage name Lewis Coates.

Cozzi's final horror film Paganini Horror was a major disappointment to him, since he was unable to work effectively within the tiny budget he was given. Argento's wife Daria Nicolodi co-wrote the script with Cozzi and starred in it. In 1987-88, Cozzi directed 9 episodes of the Italian television series Turno Di Notte (some of which starred Asia Argento and Daria Nicolodi). He later made two documentaries on the films of Dario Argento, and for years operated and managed Dario Argento's retail movie memorabilia store in Italy.

Filmography (as Director)[link]

• The Neighbor (1973) Italian made-for-TV Movie, this was an episode of Dario Argento's "Doorway To Darkness" series
• Eyewitness (1973) Italian made-for-TV Movie (Cozzi just wrote the screenplay; he didn't direct this film)
• The Killer Must Kill Again (1975) aka "The Spider/ Il Ragno", giallo starring George Hilton
• Take All of Me (1978) aka "Dedicated to a Star" (drama)
• Starcrash (1979) aka "Stella Star", aka "Female Space Invaders". starring Caroline Munro, David Hasselhoff and Joe Spinnell
• Contamination (1980) aka "Toxic Spawn", aka "Alien Contamination", starring Ian McCulloch
• Hercules (1983) starring Lou Ferrigno & Sybil Danning
• Hercules 2 (1985) aka "The Adventures of Hercules", starring Lou Ferrigno & William Berger
• Turno di Notte (1987–88) Cozzi directed nine episodes of this Italian TV series (some of which starred Asia Argento and Daria Nicolodi)
• Nosferatu in Venice (1988) aka "Vampire in Venice", starring Klaus Kinski (Cozzi co-directed this film)
• Sinbad of the Seven Seas (1989) starring Lou Ferrigno (Cozzi co-wrote, co-directed and edited this film)
• De Profundis/ From The Deep (1989) aka "The Black Cat" or "Demons 6" (starring Caroline Munro & Brett Halsey)
• Paganini Horror (1989) co-written by Daria Nicolodi
• Dario Argento: Master of Horror (1991) (documentary on Dario Argento)
• Il Mondo di Dario Argento 3: The Museum of Horrors (1997) aka "The World of Dario Argento 3" (documentary on Dario Argento)

References[link]

• Luigi Cozzi at the Internet Movie Database

Luigi (ルイージ, Ruīji^?) is a fictional character, featured in video games and related media released by Nintendo. Created by prominent game designer Shigeru Miyamoto, Luigi is portrayed as the slightly younger fraternal twin brother of Nintendo's mascot Mario, and appears in many games throughout the Mario series, frequently as a sidekick to his brother and the deuteragonist of the series.

Luigi first appeared in the 1983 arcade game Mario Bros. as the character controlled by the second player, and retained this role in Super Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros. 3, Super Mario World, and other titles. The first game where he was available as a primary character was Super Mario Bros. 2. In more recent appearances, Luigi's role became increasingly restricted to spinoffs such as the Mario Party and Mario Kart series, though he has been featured in a starring role on two occasions: first in the 1991 educational game Mario is Missing, later in Luigi's Mansion for the Nintendo GameCube in 2001 and in Luigi's Mansion 2 for the 3DS. In both of these games, he is called upon to act as the hero because Mario, the usual hero within the franchise, is in need of rescue. Luigi has also appeared in every episode of the three DiC TV series based on the Nintendo Entertainment System and Super Nintendo Entertainment System games.

Originally developed as a palette swap of Mario with a green color scheme instead of red, Luigi has since developed a personality and style of his own. As his role in the Mario series progressed, Luigi evolved into a physically distinct character, taller and thinner than his brother. Although as kindhearted as Mario, Luigi is portrayed as timid and sometimes cowardly, especially in the presence of ghosts or when faced with seemingly impossible tasks to accomplish.

Concept and creation[link]

The events leading to Luigi's creation began in 1982, during the development of Donkey Kong, where the Nintendo designer Shigeru Miyamoto had created Mario (then known as "Jumpman") hoping that he would be able to recast the character in a variety of different roles in future games.^[1] Miyamoto had been inspired by the game Joust to create a game with a simultaneous two-player mode, which led to his development of the game Mario Bros. in 1983, with Luigi filling the role of Mario's brother as the second playable character.^[2] Luigi's name is said to have been inspired by a pizza parlor near Nintendo of America's headquarters in Redmond, Washington, called "Mario & Luigi's".^[2] Miyamoto observed that the word ruiji means "similar" in the Japanese language, and that Luigi was designed to have the same size, shape and gameplay of Mario.^[3]

While Mario was originally portrayed as a carpenter in Donkey Kong, the duo of Mario and Luigi in Mario Bros. were styled as Italian plumbers by Miyamoto, on the suggestion of a colleague.^[4] Software constraints of the time—similar to those that gave Mario his distinctive look in Donkey Kong—meant Luigi's first appearance was restricted to a simple palette swap of Mario designed to represent the second player. Graphically and in terms of gameplay, the characters were completely identical, except for their color schemes;^[5] the green color scheme adopted for Luigi would remain one of his defining physical characteristics in subsequent releases.

After the success of Mario Bros., Luigi was introduced to a wider audience in 1985 with the release of the console game Super Mario Bros. Once again his role was restricted to a palette swap of Mario, functioning as the second-player in a similar fashion to Mario Bros.. The subsequent Japan-only version of Super Mario Bros. 2 in 1986 (later released in the west as Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels) marked the beginning of Luigi's development toward becoming a more distinguished character. As with his previous appearances, Luigi remained a palette swap of Mario; however, his movement was no longer identical. Luigi could now jump higher and farther than his brother, at the expense of movement response and precision.^[6]

While this version of Super Mario Bros. 2 was released in Japan, it was deemed to be too difficult for American audiences at the time.^[4] In 1988, consequently, an alternative release was developed to serve as Super Mario Bros. 2 for western players (and later released in Japan as Super Mario USA); this version would play a key role in shaping Luigi's current appearance.^[4] The game was a conversion of Yume Kōjō: Doki Doki Panic, with the graphics altered to represent characters and scenes from the Mario franchise. In this release, the character of "Mama", who had the highest jump among the original cast, served as the template for Luigi, resulting in his taller, thinner look, combined with his Marioesque outfit and ubiquitous green color scheme. Official artwork for Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World depicts Luigi with this new look; but Nintendo of Japan would not adapt his artwork differences to his look in-game until the 1992 game Super Mario Kart. Luigi's distinctive appearance from the Yume Kōjō: Doki Doki Panic-inspired version of Super Mario Bros. 2 has been used ever since, even for remakes of games in which he was originally a palette swap.

This emblem appears on Luigi's hat and as a symbol for him in many game interfaces.

Actor portrayal[link]

Upon debuting on the Nintendo 64, Luigi received a voice, provided by Charles Martinet, who also voices Mario, Wario, Waluigi, and Toadsworth. Much like his appearance, Luigi's vocal portrayal has fluctuated over the years. When first introduced in Mario Kart 64, Luigi's voice was considerably lower in pitch than Mario's (although it was high pitched in the Japanese version^{[citation needed]}); however, in Mario Party, his voice has a much higher pitch, similar to Mario's voice (the same voice from the Japanese Mario Kart 64). He retained this higher voice in Mario Party 2. In Mario Golf, Mario Tennis, and Mario Party 3, his voice returned to a lower state. Since then, with the exceptions of Mario Kart: Super Circuit and Super Smash Bros. Melee, Luigi has consistently had a medium-pitched voice. In Mario Kart: Super Circuit, Luigi's voice was the same high voice from the Japanese Mario Kart 64. In Super Smash Bros. and Super Smash Bros. Melee, Luigi's voice is made up of clips from Mario's voice taken from Super Mario 64, with raised pitches. In Super Smash Bros. Brawl, he has his own voice (which is medium-pitched) instead of a pitched-up version of Mario's.