The Old Guard (Italian: Vecchia guardia) is a 1934 Italian drama film directed by Alessandro Blasetti and starring Gianfranco Giachetti, Mino Doro, and Franco Brambilla. It was one of several pro-Fascist films made by Blasetti during the era. The film is set in a small Italian town in 1922, where a local group of Fascist blackshirts battle against rival socialists who have called a strike at the hospital. Mario, the young son of Doctor Cardini, is killed in the fighting. The film ends with the March on Rome that brought Benito Mussolini to power.
Although intended as sympathetic to the regime, and the methods by which it came to power, the film was not popular with the Fascist hierarchy who felt its portrayal of violence undermined the respectable image the National Fascist Party was now trying to cultivate.
Cast
Gianfranco Giachetti as Dott. Claudio Cardini
Mino Doro as Roberto
Franco Brambilla as Mario
Maria Puccini as La moglie
Barbara Monis as La maestra
Graziella Antonelli as La sorella della maestra
Ugo Ceseri as Marcone
Umberto Sacripante as Il pazzo Tralicò
Graziela Betti as La ragazza del convento
Gino Viotti as Il sindaco
Cesare Zoppetti as L'assessore
Aristide Garbini as L'uscere
Italo Tancredi as L'infermiere
Andrea Checchi as Pompeo
Ugo Sasso as Uno squadrista