Italian 50's-60's Cinema (Incl. Neorealismo)
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- Editor
- Director
- Writer
Silvano Agosti was born on 23 March 1938 in Brescia, Lombardy, Italy. He is an editor and director, known for Uova di garofano (1991), Quartiere (1987) and Fit to Be Untied (1975)._____________________________________________________
1960 Requiem (S) ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1967 Il giardino delle delizie ★★★★★★★★★ (9/10)
1971 N.P. il segreto ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1975 Il volo (S) ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Director
- Writer
- Cinematographer
Raffaele Andreassi was born on 2 August 1924 in L'Aquila, Abruzzo, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Flashback (1969), I vecchi (1960) and Antonio Ligabue, pittore (1965). He died on 20 November 2008 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1969 Flashback ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Writer
- Director
- Editor
Together with Fellini, Bergman and Kurosawa, Michelangelo Antonioni is credited with defining the modern art film. And yet Antonioni's cinema is also recognized today for defying any easy categorization, with his films ultimately seeming to belong to their own distinctive genre. Indeed, the difficulty of precisely describing their category is itself the very quintessence of Antonioni's films. Among the most-cited contributions of Antonioni's cinema are their striking descriptions of that unique strain of post-boom ennui everywhere apparent in the transformed life and leisure habits of the Italian middle and upper classes. Detecting profound technological, political and psychological shifts at work in post-WWII Italy, Antonioni set out to explore the ambiguities of a suddenly alienated and dislocated Italy, not simply through his oblique style of narrative and characters, nor through any overt political messaging, but instead by tearing asunder the traditional boundaries of cinematic narrative in order to explore an ever shifting internal landscape expressed through architecture, urban space and the sculptural, shaping presence of objects, shapes and emotions invented by camera movement and depth of focus.
Antonioni deftly manipulates the quieter, indirect edges of cinematic structure, often so discretely that his existential puzzles are felt before they can be intellectualized. The negative space is as prominent as the positive, silence as loud as noise, absence as palpable as presence, and passivity as driving a force as direct action. Transgressing unspoken cinematic laws, Antonioni frequently focuses on female protagonists while refusing to sentimentalize or morally judge his characters and placing them on equal footing with the other elements within his total dynamic system, like sounds or set pieces. And he violates spoken rules with unconventional cutting techniques, fractured spatial and temporal continuity, and a camera that insistently lingers in melancholy pauses, long after the actors depart, as if drifting just behind an equally distracted, dissipating narrative. Leaving questions unanswered and plot points irresolute, dispensing with exposition, suspense, sentimentality and other cinematic security blankets, Antonioni releases the viewer into a gorgeous, densely layered fog to contemplate and wrestle with his characters' imprecise quandaries and endless possibilities. Culminating in tour de force endings that often reframe the narrative in a daring, parting act of deconstruction, Antonioni's rigorously formal, yet open compositions allow his great, unwieldy questions to spill over into the world outside the cinema and outside of time.
Born into a middle-class family in the northern Italian town of Ferrara, Antonioni studied economics at the University of Bologna where he also co-founded the university's theatrical troupe. While dedicating himself to painting, writing film reviews, working in financial positions and in different capacities on film productions, Antonioni suffered a few false starts before expressing his unique directorial vision and voice in his first realized short film, Gente del Po, a moving portrait of fisherman in the misty Po Valley where he was raised. Uncomfortable with the neo-realist thrust of Italian cinema, Antonioni directed a series of eccentric and oblique documentary shorts that, in retrospect, reveal his desire to investigate the psyche's mysterious interiors. In his first fictional feature, Story of a Love Affair, Antonioni immediately subtly challenged traditional plot and audience expectation in ways that anticipate the formal and emotional expressionist dynamic that would fully flower within the groundbreaking L'Avventura (1960).
Reversing its raucous 1960 premiere to an infuriated Cannes audience, L'Avventura was rapturously lauded by fellow artists and filmmakers and awarded a special Jury Prize "for its remarkable contribution toward the search for a new cinematic language." It also presented the controlled ambivalence of Monica Vitti, who would become his partner, muse and psychological constant throughout his famed trilogy of L'Avventura, La Notte (1961) and L'Eclisse (1962) in addition to the exquisite Red Desert (1964), a film that marked another significant shift toward expressive color, male leads and working with soft focus and faster cuts. After the phenomenal commercial success of the MGM-produced Blow-Up (1966), Antonioni was devastated by the anti-climactic box office disaster of Zabriskie Point (1970) and returned to documentary. Invited to make Chung Kuo China by the Chinese government, Antonioni delivered a mesmerizing yet unsentimental four-hour tour of China which was vehemently rejected by its solicitors. A few years later, Antonioni returned to fictional form in his last masterpiece, The Passenger (1975), an enigmatic fable of vaporous identity that offers a bold companion piece to L'Avventura. Aside from the thematically retrospective Identification of a Woman (1982) and a period film made for television, The Mystery of Oberwald (1980) in which he conducted unusual experiments with color and video, Antonioni closed out his career with mostly short films, many of which were made after he suffered a stroke in 1985.
Tremendously influential yet largely taken for granted, Antonioni made difficult, abstract cinema mainstream. Embracing an anarchic geometry, Antonioni turned the architecture of narrative filmmaking inside-out in the most eloquent way possible, with many of his iconic scenes eternally preserved in the depths of the cinema's psyche. Observing modern maladies without judgment - sexism, dissolution of family and tradition, ecological/technological quandaries and the eternal questions of our place in the cosmos - Antonioni's prescience continues to resonate deeply as we find our way in the quickly moving fog._____________________________________________________
1950 Cronaca di un amore ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1953 La signora senza camelie ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1953 I vinti ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1955 Le amiche ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1957 Il grido ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1960 L'avventura ★★★★★★★★★★ (10/10)
1961 La notte ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1962 L'eclisse ★★★★★★★★★ (9/10)
1964 Il deserto rosso ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1966 Blowup ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1970 Zabriskie Point ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1975 Professione: reporter ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1980 Il mistero di Oberwald ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1982 Identificazione di una donna ★★★★★ (5/10)
1995 Al di là delle nuvole ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Director
- Writer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Luigi Bazzoni was born on 25 June 1929 in Salsomaggiore Terme, Emilia-Romagna, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Di domenica (1963), The Possessed (1965) and The Fifth Cord (1971). He died on 1 March 2012 in Salsomaggiore Terme, Emilia-Romagna, Italy._____________________________________________________
1965 La donna del lago ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Writer
- Director
- Actor
Marco Bellocchio is one of the most consistent and most adventurous of today's Italian directors-an achievement all the more remarkable given that he made his feature debut almost fifty years ago. Over those years, he has amassed a body of films that encompasses a large number of original screenplays, adaptations of the likes of Pirandello and Kleist and personal, quasi-autobiographical work. What unifies these films is the beauty and originality of Bellocchio's images and his unceasing quest to understand the place of the individual in contemporary Italy and contemporary cinema. After making a few shorts, Bellocchio announced himself with his ferocious first feature, the acclaimed Fists in the Pocket (1965). This caustic and anarchic look at an extremely troubled family launched him instantly to the first ranks of the Italian film scene, alongside Antonioni, Pasolini and Bertolucci. For the next several years, films such as China Is Near (1967) and In the Name of the Father (1971) found Bellocchio examining the turbulent world of leftist politics and revolutionary dreams with an eye both sympathetic and jaundiced. During the 1980s and 1990s, under the spell of unorthodox-and, to some, controversial-psychoanalyst Massimo Fagioli, Bellocchio's emphasis turned to examining the interweaving of family dynamics and sexual desire as they produce and undermine personal identities. Films such as A Leap in the Dark (1980) and Devil in the Flesh (1986) create complex allegories of an audacious originality. More recently, Bellocchio has turned to more straightforward narratives in a number of films that examine Italy's recent past and its present, from The Nanny (1999) to one of his most recent works, Dormant Beauty (2012). Shifting brilliantly from realist fiction to archival footage to the imagery of dream or fantasy, all within a single film, this recent period has returned Bellocchio to the forefront of contemporary cinema, while combining the lessons learned from both the previous political and allegorical work. What has remained constant is Bellocchio's searching critique of the institutions that control individuals and organize the flow of power: the army, political parties, schools, the state and its laws, the Church, and the family._____________________________________________________
1965 I pugni in tasca ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)- Writer
- Director
- Producer
Bernardo Bertolucci, the Italian director whose films were known for their colorful visual style, was born in Parma, Italy. He attended Rome University and became famous as a poet. He served as assistant director for Pier Paolo Pasolini in the film Accattone (1961) and directed The Grim Reaper (1962). His second film, Before the Revolution (1964), which was released in 1971, received an Academy Award nomination for best screenplay. Bertolucci also received an Academy Award nomination as best director for Last Tango in Paris (1972), and the best director and best screenplay for the film The Last Emperor (1987), which walked away with nine Academy Awards._____________________________________________________
1962 La commare secca ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1964 Il canale (S) ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1964 Prima della rivoluzione ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1967 La via del petrolio (D) ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1970 Il conformista ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1972 Ultimo tango a Parigi ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1976 Novecento ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Director
- Writer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Mauro Bolognini was born on 28 February 1922 in Pistoia, Tuscany, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Madamigella di Maupin (1966), Mosca addio (1987) and Careless (1962). He died on 14 May 2001 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1960 Il bell'Antonio ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1966 Madamigella di Maupin ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Writer
- Director
_____________________________________________________
1968 Summit ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Director
- Writer
- Editor
Mario Camerini was born on 6 February 1895 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Il signor Max (1937), I'll Give a Million (1935) and I grandi magazzini (1939). He was married to Assia Noris. He died on 4 February 1981 in Gardone Riviera, Lombardy, Italy._____________________________________________________
1960 Via Margutta ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Director
- Writer
Luigi Capuano was born on 13 July 1904 in Naples, Campania, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Suor Maria (1955), Rondini in volo (1949) and Cuore di mamma (1954). He died on 20 October 1979 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1959 Il mondo dei miracoli ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Writer
- Director
- Actor
Luigi Comencini was born on 8 June 1916 in Salò, Lombardy, Italy. He was a writer and director, known for Voltati Eugenio (1980), Everybody Go Home! (1960) and Bread, Love and Dreams (1953). He was married to Giulia Grifeo. He died on 6 April 2007 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1957 Mariti in città ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1965 La bugiarda ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1966 Incompreso ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)- Writer
- Director
Piero Costa is known for Un alibi per morire (1962), Barrier of the Law (1954) and La catena dell'odio (1955)._____________________________________________________
1958 La ragazza di piazza San Pietro ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Writer
- Director
- Actor
The women who both attracted and frightened him and an Italy dominated in his youth by Mussolini and Pope Pius XII - inspired the dreams that Fellini started recording in notebooks in the 1960s. Life and dreams were raw material for his films. His native Rimini and characters like Saraghina (the devil herself said the priests who ran his school) - and the Gambettola farmhouse of his paternal grandmother would be remembered in several films. His traveling salesman father Urbano Fellini showed up in La Dolce Vita (1960) and 8½ (1963). His mother Ida Barbiani was from Rome and accompanied him there in 1939. He enrolled in the University of Rome. Intrigued by the image of reporters in American films, he tried out the real life role of journalist and caught the attention of several editors with his caricatures and cartoons and then started submitting articles. Several articles were recycled into a radio series about newlyweds "Cico and Pallina". Pallina was played by acting student Giulietta Masina, who became his real life wife from October 30, 1943, until his death half a century later. The young Fellini loved vaudeville and was befriended in 1940 by leading comedian Aldo Fabrizi. Roberto Rossellini wanted Fabrizi to play Don Pietro in Rome, Open City (1945) and made the contact through Fellini. Fellini worked on that film's script and is on the credits for Rosselini's Paisan (1946). On that film he wandered into the editing room, started observing how Italian films were made (a lot like the old silent films with an emphasis on visual effects, dialogue dubbed in later). Fellini in his mid-20s had found his life's work._____________________________________________________
1950 Luci del varietà ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1952 Lo sceicco bianco ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1953 I vitelloni ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1954 La strada ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1955 Il bidone ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1957 Le notti di Cabiria ★★★★★★★★★ (9/10)
1960 La dolce vita ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1963 8½ ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1965 Giulietta degli spiriti ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1969 Fellini - Satyricon ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1972 Roma ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1973 Amarcord ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Writer
- Director
- Actor
Marco Ferreri was born on 11 May 1928 in Milan, Lombardy, Italy. He was a writer and director, known for Tales of Ordinary Madness (1981), L'udienza (1972) and El cochecito (1960). He was married to Jacqueline Ferreri. He died on 9 May 1997 in Paris, France._____________________________________________________
1963 L'ape regina ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Writer
- Director
- Producer
Marcello Fondato was born on 8 January 1924 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was a writer and director, known for I protagonisti (1968), Ninì Tirabusciò, la donna che inventò la mossa (1970) and Watch Out, We're Mad (1974). He died on 13 November 2008 in San Felice Circeo, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1969 Certo, certissimo, anzi... probabile ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Actor
- Director
- Writer
Sandro Franchina was born on 25 September 1939. He was an actor and director, known for Morire gratis (1968), Europe '51 (1952) and La nemica (1952). He died on 22 February 1998 in Paris, France._____________________________________________________
1969 Morire gratis ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Writer
- Director
- Actor
Lucio Fulci, born in Rome in 1927, remains as controversial in death as he was in life. A gifted craftsman with a sharp tongue and a wicked sense of dark humor, Fulci achieved some measure of notoriety for his gore epics of the late 1970s and early 1980s, but respect was long in coming.
Abandoning his early career as a med student, Fulci entered the film industry as a screenwriter and assistant director, working alongside such directors as Steno and Riccardo Freda. Granted his debut feature in 1959, with a seldom seen comedy called I ladri (1959) (The Thieves), Fulci quickly established himself as a prolific craftsman adept at musicals, comedies and westerns.
In 1968, Fulci made his first mystery thriller, One on Top of the Other (1969), and its success was sufficient to garner the backing for his pet project The Conspiracy of Torture (1969). Based on a true story, the film details the trial of a young woman accused of murdering her sexually abusive father amid fear and superstition in 16th Century Italy. A scathing commentary on church and state, the film was the first to give voice to its director's passionate hatred of the Catholic Church. Predictably, the film was misunderstood, and Fulci's career was thrown into jeopardy. Deciding it would be best to leave his political feelings on the back burner, Fulci pressed on with a series of slickly commercial ventures.
In 1971 and 1972, Fulci re-established himself in the thriller arena, directing two excellent giallos: the haunting A Lizard in a Woman's Skin (1971) and the disturbing Don't Torture a Duckling (1972). The former, with its vivid hallucinations involving murderous hippies and vivisected canines, and the latter, with its psychotic religious zealots and brutal child killings, were -- to say the least -- controversial. In particular, Don't Torture a Duckling (1972), despite a huge box-office success, painted too graphic a portrait of perverted Catholicism, and Fulci's career was derailed... some would say, permanently. Blacklisted (albeit briefly) and despised in his homeland, Fulci at least found work in television and with the adventure genre with two financially successful Jack London 'White Fang' adventure movies in 1973 and 1974 which were Zanna Bianca, and Il ritorno di Zanna Bianca. Also during the mid and late 1970s, Fulci also directed two 'Spaghetti Westerns'; The Four of the Apocalypse... (1975) and Silver Saddle (1978), (Silver Saddle) and another 'giallo'; The Psychic (1977), as well as a few sex-comedies which include the political spoof The Eroticist (1972) (aka: The Eroticist), and the vampire spoof Dracula in the Provinces (1975) (aka: Young Dracula), and the violent Mafia crime-drama Contraband (1980).
In 1979, Fulci's film making career hit another high point with him breaking into the international market with Zombie (1979), an in-name-only sequel to George A. Romero's Dawn of the Dead (1978), which had been released in Italy as 'Zombi'. With its flamboyant imagery, graphic gore and moody atmospherics, the film established Fulci as a gore director par excellence. It was a role he accepted, but with some reservations.
Over the next three years, Fulci plied his trade with finesse and flair, rivaling even the popularity of his "opponent" Dario Argento, with such sanguine classics as City of the Living Dead (1980) and The Beyond (1981). Frequently derided as sheer sensationalism, these films, as well as the reviled The New York Ripper (1982) are actually intelligently crafted, with sound commentaries on everything from American life to religion. High on vivid imagery and pure cinematic style, Fulci's films from this period of the early 1980s represent some of his most popular work in America and abroad, even if they do pale in comparison to his 1972 masterpiece and personal favorite Don't Torture a Duckling (1972) (an impossible act to follow, as it happens).
In the mid-1980s, at the peak of his most prolific period, Fulci became beset with personal problems and worsening health. Much of his work from the mid-1980s onward is disappointing, to say the least, but flashes of his brilliance can be seen in works like Murder-Rock: Dancing Death (1984) and The Devil's Honey (1986). A Cat in the Brain (1990), one of Fulci's last works, remains one of his most original. Though strapped by budgetary restraints and marred by mediocre photography, the film is wickedly subversive and comical. With Fulci playing the lead role (as more or less himself, no less -- a harried horror director who fears that his obsession with sex and violence is a sign of mental disease), Fulci also proves to be an endearing and competent actor (he also has cameos in many of his films, frequently as a detective or doctor figure).
By the 1990s, Fulci went on a hiatus with film making for further health and personal reasons as the Italian cinema market went into a further decline. While in pre-production for the Dario Argento-produced The Wax Mask (1997), Lucio Fulci passed away at his home on March 13, 1996 at the age of 68. A serious diabetic most of his adult life, he inexplicably forgot to take his insulin before retiring to bed; some consider his death a suicide, others consider it an accident, but his many fans all consider it to be a tragedy. Whether one considers him to be a hack or a genius, there's no denying that he was unique._____________________________________________________
1963 Gli imbroglioni ★★★★★ (5/10)- Writer
- Director
- Actor
Pietro Germi was born on 14 September 1914 in Genoa, Liguria, Italy. He was a writer and director, known for The Railroad Man (1956), Divorce Italian Style (1961) and The Birds, the Bees and the Italians (1966). He was married to Olga D'Aiello and Anna Bancio. He died on 5 December 1974 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1961 Divorzio all'italiana ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Director
- Writer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Sergio Grieco was born on 13 January 1917 in Codevigo, Veneto, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Il sergente Klems (1971), Beast with a Gun (1977) and Il figlio del circo (1963). He was married to Susan Terry. He died on 30 March 1982 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1966 Rififí ad Amsterdam ★★★★★ (4/10)
1966 Missione speciale Lady Chaplin ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Writer
- Director
- Actor
Mino Guerrini was born on 16 December 1927 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was a writer and director, known for Cuando calienta el sol... vamos a la playa (1982), Gli altri racconti di Canterbury (1972) and Omicidio per appuntamento (1967). He died on 10 January 1990 in Rimini, Emilia-Romagna, Italy._____________________________________________________
1968 Gangsters '70 ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
- Director
- Script and Continuity Department
Paolo Heusch was born on 26 February 1924 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was an assistant director and director, known for Un uomo facile (1959), Caligula (1979) and Una vita violenta (1962). He died on 21 October 1982 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1962 Una vita violenta ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)- Director
- Writer
- Actor
Carlo Lizzani was born on 3 April 1922 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for The Violent Four (1968), Chronicle of Poor Lovers (1954) and Celluloide (1996). He was married to Edith Bieber. He died on 5 October 2013 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1964 La vita agra ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
- Actor
- Writer
Mario Maffei was born in 1918 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He is an assistant director and actor, known for Da Berlino l'apocalisse (1967), Ringo's Big Night (1966) and I promessi sposi (1964)._____________________________________________________
1967 Da Berlino l'apocalisse ★★★ (3/10)- Director
- Writer
- Producer
Romolo Marcellini was born on 6 October 1910 in Montecosaro, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Sentinelle di bronzo (1937), The Orientals (1960) and Nell'anno della luna (1969). He died on 3 June 1999 in Civitanova Marche, Macerata, Marche, Italy._____________________________________________________
1957 I fidanzati della morte ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Writer
- Director
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Alberto De Martino was born on 12 June 1929 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was a writer and director, known for The Chosen (1977), The Pumaman (1980) and The Invincible Gladiator (1961). He died on 2 June 2015 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1966 Upperseven, l'uomo da uccidere ★★★★★★ (5/10)
1966 Missione speciale Lady Chaplin ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1967 OK Connery ★★★★ (4/10)
1968 Roma come Chicago (Banditi a Roma) ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1969 Femmine insaziabili ★★★★★★ (5/10)- Director
- Writer
- Actor
Francesco Maselli was born on 9 December 1930 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Storia d'amore (1986), Codice privato (1988) and Time of Indifference (1964). He was married to Stefania Brai and Goliarda Sapienza. He died on 21 March 2023 in Rome, Italy._____________________________________________________
1957 La donna del giorno ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1960 I delfini ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1964 Gli indifferenti ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Writer
- Director
- Producer
Raffaello Matarazzo started writing film reviews for the Roman newspaper Il Tevere before re-editing scripts for the Italian film company Cines. His first films were comedies until he shifted to making melodramas. With Chains (1949), produced by Titanus in 1949, he became the most successful director in Italy. Audience loved his melodramas. Critics, however, have tended to disparage his work and dismiss it as 'saccharine neorealism.' Since the 1970s, some film critics have tried to restore Matarazzo's reputation. French magazine Positif loved his erotic-historical drama The Ship of Damned Women (1953)._____________________________________________________
1958 Malinconico autunno ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Writer
- Director
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Mario Monicelli was born on 16 May 1915 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was a writer and director, known for The Organizer (1963), Speriamo che sia femmina (1986) and Big Deal on Madonna Street (1958). He was married to Chiara Rapaccini and Antonella Salerni. He died on 29 November 2010 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1958 I soliti ignoti ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1959 La grande guerra ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1963 I compagni ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Director
- Writer
- Cinematographer
Ermanno Olmi was born on 24 July 1931 in Bergamo, Lombardy, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for The Tree of Wooden Clogs (1978), The Legend of the Holy Drinker (1988) and Il posto (1961). He was married to Loredana Detto. He died on 5 May 2018 in Asiago, Veneto, Italy._____________________________________________________
1953 Piccoli calabresi a Suna sul Lago Maggiore (S) ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1954 La pattuglia del Passo S. Giacomo (S) ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1954 Dialogo di un venditore di almanacchi e di un passeggiere (S) ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1955 La diga del ghiacciaio (S) ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1955 La mia valle (S) ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1955 L'energia elettrica nell'agricoltura (S) ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1956 Il pensionato (S) ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1958 Tre fili fino a Milano (S) ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1959 Giochi di colonia (S) ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1959 Il tempo si è fermato ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1961 Il posto ★★★★★★★★★★ (10/10)
1963 I fidanzati ★★★★★★★★★ (9/10)
1965 E venne un uomo ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1967 La cotta ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1968 Un certo giorno ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1978 L'albero degli zoccoli ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1983 Milano '83 (D) ★★★★★★★★★ (9/10)- Writer
- Director
- Actor
Pier Paolo Pasolini achieved fame and notoriety long before he entered the film industry. A published poet at 19, he had already written numerous novels and essays before his first screenplay in 1954. His first film Accattone (1961) was based on his own novel and its violent depiction of the life of a pimp in the slums of Rome caused a sensation. He was arrested in 1962 when his contribution to the portmanteau film Ro.Go.Pa.G. (1963) was considered blasphemous and given a suspended sentence. It might have been expected that his next film, The Gospel According to St. Matthew (1964) (The Gospel According to St. Matthew), which presented the Biblical story in a totally realistic, stripped-down style, would cause a similar fuss but, in fact, it was rapturously acclaimed as one of the few honest portrayals of Christ on screen. Its original Italian title pointedly omitted the Saint in St. Matthew). Pasolini's film career would then alternate distinctly personal and often scandalously erotic adaptations of classic literary texts: Oedipus Rex (1967) (Oedipus Rex); The Decameron (1971); The Canterbury Tales (1972) (The Canterbury Tales); Arabian Nights (1974) (Arabian Nights), with his own more personal projects, expressing his controversial views on Marxism, atheism, fascism and homosexuality, notably Teorema (1968) (Theorem), Pigsty and the notorious Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom (1975), a relentlessly grim fusion of Benito Mussolini's Fascist Italy with the 'Marquis de Sade' which was banned in Italy and many other countries for several years. Pasolini was murdered in still-mysterious circumstances shortly after completing the film._____________________________________________________
1961 Accattone ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1962 Mamma Roma ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1964 Il vangelo secondo Matteo ★★★★★★★★★ (9/10)
1966 Uccellacci e uccellini ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1967 Edipo re ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1968 Teorema ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1969 Medea ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1969 Porcile ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Director
- Writer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Gillo Pontecorvo was an Italian filmmaker. He is best known for his 1966 masterpiece, The Battle of Algiers, widely viewed as one of the finest films of its genre: realistic though fictionalized documentary. Its portrayal of the Algerian resistance during the Algerian War uses the neorealist style pioneered by fellow Italian film directors de Santis and Rossellini, employing newsreel-style footage and non-professional actors, and focusing primarily on a disenfranchised population that seldom receives attention from the general media. Though very much Italian neorealist in style, Pontecorvo co-produced with an Algerian film company.
The Battle of Algiers achieved great success and influence. It was widely screened in the United States, where Pontecorvo received a number of awards. He was also nominated for two Academy Awards.
Pontecorvo's next major work, Queimada! (Burn!, 1969), is also anti-colonial, this time set in the Antilles. This film (starring Marlon Brando) depicts an attempted revolution of the oppressed. Pontecorvo continued his series of highly political films with Ogro (1979), which addresses the occurrence of terrorism at the end of Francisco Franco's dwindling regime in Spain.
In 2006, he died from congestive heart failure in Rome at age 86._____________________________________________________
1966 La battaglia di Algeri ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)- Director
- Writer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Dino Risi became a movie director by chance. In 1940 he met Alberto Lattuada at a friend's boutique. Lattuada told him they needed an assistant director for the movie Piccolo mondo antico (1941). Risi accepted just for fun, not for work. Later, he became a psychiatrist and wrote some articles for a local newspaper in his spare time.
After the Second World War, he met a producer who financed his short films. One of these, Buio in sala (1950), was bought by Carlo Ponti. At that point, Risi decided to become a movie director. So he went to Rome and wrote the plot of Poor But Beautiful (1957) which made him famous. But the film that changed his life forever was The Easy Life (1962). At the opening night, Risi and producer Mario Cecchi Gori were waiting outside the movie theater. They were worried because no viewers had been coming to see the movie. So Risi went back home with much disappointment. However, the next day all the tickets were sold out and Risi became a star._____________________________________________________
1957 Belle ma povere ★★★★★ (5/10)
1961 Una vita difficile ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1962 Il sorpasso ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)- Writer
- Director
- Actor
Brunello Rondi was born on 26 November 1924 in Tirano, Lombardy, Italy. He was a writer and director, known for 8½ (1963), La Dolce Vita (1960) and Il demonio (1963). He died on 7 November 1989 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1962 Una vita violenta ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)- Writer
- Director
- Producer
The master filmmaker Roberto Rossellini, as one of the creators of neo-realism, is one of the most influential directors of all time. His neo-realist films influenced France's nouvelle vague movement in the 1950s and '60s that changed the face of international cinema. He also influenced American directors, including Martin Scorsese.
He was born into the world of film, making his debut in Rome on May 8, 1906, the son of Elettra (Bellan), a housewife, and Angiolo Giuseppe "Beppino" Rossellini, the man who opened Italy's first cinema. He was immersed in cinema from the beginning, growing up watching movies in his father's movie-house from the time that film was first quickening as an art form. Italy was one of the places were movie-making matured, and Italian film had a huge influence on D.W. Griffith and other international directors. Between the two world wars, Hollywood would soon dictate what constituted a "well-made" film, but Rossellini would be one of the Italian directors who once again put Italy at the forefront of international cinema after the Second World War.
His training in cinema was thorough and extensive and he became expert in many facets of film-making. (His brother Renzo Rossellini, also was involved in the industry, scoring films.) He did his apprenticeship as an assistant to Italian filmmakers, then got the chance to make his first film, a documentary, "Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune", in 1937. Due to his close ties to Benito Mussolini's second son, the critic and film producer Vittorio Mussolini, he flourished in fascist Italy's cinema. Once Il Duce was deposed, Rossellini produced his first classic film, the anti-fascist Rome, Open City (1945) ("Rome, Open City") in 1945, which won the Grand Prize at Cannes. Two other neo-realist classics soon followed, Paisan (1946) ("Paisan") and Germany Year Zero (1948) ("Germany in the Year Zero"). "Rome, Open City" screenwriters Sergio Amidei and Federico Fellini were nominated for a Best Writing, Screenplay Oscar in 1947, while Rossellini himself, along with Amidei, Fellini and two others were nominated for a screen-writing Oscar in 1950 for "Paisan".
"I do not want to make beautiful films, I want to make useful films," he said. Rossellini claimed, "I try to capture reality, nothing else." This led him to often cast non-professional actors, then tailor his scripts to their idiosyncrasies and life-stories to heighten the sense of realism.
With other practitioners of neo-realism, Vittorio De Sica and Luchino Visconti, film was changed forever. American director Elia Kazan credits neo-realism with his own evolution as a filmmaker, away from Hollywood's idea of the well-made film to the gritty realism of On the Waterfront (1954).
Rossellini had a celebrated, adulterous affair with Ingrid Bergman that was an international scandal. They became lovers on the set of Stromboli (1950) while both were married to other people and Bergman became pregnant. After they shed their spouses and married, producing three children, history repeated itself when Rossellini cheated on her with the Indian screenwriter Sonali Senroy DasGupta while he was in India at the request of Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to help revitalize that country's film industry. It touched off another international scandal, and Nehru ousted him from the country. Rossellini later divorced Bergman to marry Das Gupta, legitimizing their child that had been born out-of-wedlock.
Rossellini continued to make films until nearly his death. His last film The Messiah (1975) ("The Messiah"), a story of The Passion of Christ, was released in 1975.
Roberto Rossellini died of a heart attack in Rome on June 3, 1977. He was 71 years old._____________________________________________________
1959 Il generale della Rovere ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1962 Anima nera ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1945 Roma, città aperta ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1946 Paisà ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1948 Germania, anno zero ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)- Director
- Writer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Franco Rossi was born on 28 April 1919 in Florence, Tuscany, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for The Woman in the Painting (1955), Nude Odyssey (1961) and Smog (1962). He died on 5 June 2000 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1962 Smog ★★★★★★★★★ (9/10)
1967 Una rosa per tutti ★★★★★ (5/10)- Actor
- Director
- Writer
Luciano Salce was born on 25 September 1922 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was an actor and director, known for Colpo di stato (1969), Crazy Desire (1962) and Alla mia cara mamma nel giorno del suo compleanno (1974). He was married to Jole Bertolazzi and Diletta D'Andrea. He died on 17 December 1989 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1965 Slalom ★★★★ (4/10)
1966 Come imparai ad amare le donne ★★★★★ (5/10)
1968 La pecora nera ★★★★ (4/10)- Director
- Writer
- Additional Crew
Salvatore Samperi was born on 26 July 1943 in Padua, Veneto, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Malicious (1973), Ernesto (1979) and Smell of Flesh (1974). He was married to Francesca Bardella. He died on 5 March 2009 in Trevignano Romano, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1968 Grazie zia ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Director
- Writer
- Cinematographer
Romano Scavolini was born on 18 June 1940 in Fiume, Italy [now Rijeka, Primorsko-Goranska County, Croatia]. He is a director and writer, known for Servo suo (1973), Entonce (1969) and Savage Hunt (1980)._____________________________________________________
1964 Alle tue spalle senza rumore (S) ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1966 A mosca cieca ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1967 Ecce Homo (S) ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1968 La prova generale ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1969 L'amore breve ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Director
- Writer
- Cinematographer
Vittorio De Seta was born on 15 October 1923 in Palermo, Sicily, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Bandits of Orgosolo (1961), Un uomo a metà (1966) and Islands of Fire (1955). He died on 28 November 2011 in Sellia Marina, Calabria, Italy._____________________________________________________
1961 Banditi a Orgosolo ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1966 Un uomo a metà ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1969 L'invitata ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Director
- Writer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Mauro Severino was born on 16 February 1936 in Castiglione della Pescaia, Italy. He is a director and writer, known for Chi è di scena (1963), Vergogna schifosi (1969) and Our Men in Bagdad (1966)._____________________________________________________
1969 Vergogna schifosi ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Actor
- Director
- Writer
Vittorio De Sica grew up in Naples, and started out as an office clerk in order to raise money to support his poor family. He was increasingly drawn towards acting, and made his screen debut while still in his teens, joining a stage company in 1923. By the late 1920s he was a successful matinee idol of the Italian theatre, and repeated that achievement in Italian movies, mostly light comedies. He turned to directing in 1940, making comedies in a similar vein, but with his fifth film The Children Are Watching Us (1943), he revealed hitherto unsuspected depths and an extraordinarily sensitive touch with actors, especially children. It was also the first film he made with the writer Cesare Zavattini with whom he would subsequently make Shoeshine (1946) and Bicycle Thieves (1948), heartbreaking studies of poverty in postwar Italy which won special Oscars before the foreign film category was officially established. After the box-office disaster of Umberto D. (1952), a relentlessly bleak study of the problems of old age, he returned to directing lighter work, appearing in front of the camera more frequently. Although Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow (1963) won him another Oscar, it was generally accepted that his career as one of the great directors was over. However, just before he died he made The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (1970), which won him yet another Oscar, and his final film A Brief Vacation (1973). He died following the removal of a cyst from his lungs._____________________________________________________
1951 Miracolo a Milano ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1952 Umberto D. ★★★★★★★★★ (9/10)
1960 La ciociara ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1948 Ladri di biciclette ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)- Director
- Editor
- Writer
Giorgio Simonelli was born on 23 November 1901 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was a director and editor, known for Noi siamo due evasi (1959), C'è un fantasma nel castello (1942) and Bertoldo, Bertoldino e Cacasenno (1937). He died on 3 October 1966 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1961 Che femmina!! E... che dollari! ★★★★ (4/10)- Actor
- Writer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Leopoldo Trieste was born on 3 May 1917 in Reggio Calabria, Calabria, Italy. He was an actor and writer, known for Il peccato degli anni verdi (1960), Don't Look Now (1973) and Seduced and Abandoned (1964). He died on 25 January 2003 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1958 Città di notte ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1960 Il peccato degli anni verdi ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Director
- Writer
- Actor
Eriprando Visconti was born on 24 September 1932 in Milan, Lombardy, Italy. He was a director and writer, known for Una storia milanese (1962), Snatch (1976) and A Spiral of Mist (1977). He was married to Francesca Patrizia Ruspoli di Poggio Suasa. He died on 26 May 1995 in Pavia, Lombardy, Italy._____________________________________________________
1962 Una storia milanese ★★★★★★ (6/10)- Writer
- Director
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Born in his ancestral palazzo, situated in the same Milanese square as both the opera house La Scala and the Milan Cathedral, Luchino Visconti (1906 - 1976) was raised under the auspices of aristocratic privilege, theater and Catholicism. This triangulation of monuments would create an equally titanic filmmaker whose work remained stylistically sui generis through arguably the most impressive decades of 20th century filmmaking. The quietude of La Terra Trema (1948) is managed with an operatic virtuosity, and the baroque period pieces-for which he is best known today-clearly point to a noble upbringing. However, there is also a Gothic character to Visconti-embodied in the spired cathedral that overshadowed his childhood-that has remained largely unsung. The relationship between the Visconti family and Gothic architecture stretches back to the Medieval Era. In 1386, Duke Gian Galeazzo Visconti envisioned a cathedral in the heart of Milan, though it was fated to remain under construction for almost half a millennium until Napoleon ordered its completion in the 19th century. Just as his ancestor brought Northern Gothic architecture to Italy, so, in 1943, did Luchino introduce the groundbreaking cinematic genre of Italian neorealism to the peninsula. Doing away with sets, neorealist cinema was set in the raw environment of postwar Italy. In one sense anti-architectural in its desire to transcend the bonds of interior space, this same ambition is what makes the style a perfect cinematic analog to the Gothic. The Gothic is an architecture of exteriority: Throwing ceilings to the sky and opening walls onto the outside with large windows, the Gothic presents light as the manifestation of divinity within a place of worship. The mysticism of light, dating back to the pseudo-Dionysian theology of Abbot Suger of St. Denis Cathedral, translates well to the medium of light that is the cinema. In any Visconti work, lighting is intimately connected to set design: It is often seen in the gleam of curtains, the radiance of starlight or the glow of Milanese fog, where the director carries the religiosity of Gothic architecture into his realism. Visconti's religion (or should we say religions? For he was also a Marxist) adds an ethical weight, powerful and challenging, to his works. The term decadence, often associated with Visconti, only attains meaning through being in excess of contemporary mores. Neither the Catholic Church nor the Italian communists could accept Visconti's homosexuality, and a resultant displaced angst is plainly worn by his protagonists-monumental individuals who bear the full weight of their social milieus. While neorealism has come to be packaged with its own mythology-a new cinema for a liberated nation, the idea of a new "Italian" style-re-centering our historical gaze on the Gothic Visconti allows one's imagination to spread across a much larger plane of geography and time. From his cinematic apprenticeship with Jean Renoir in France-the very cradle of Gothic architecture-to his German trilogy, Visconti's style has always been one of cosmopolitan effort. This international flavor also matches the deeper etymological referent of the Gothic-the Goths, those barbarian invaders who toppled the Roman Empire. Among Visconti's formal signatures are many borrowings from foreign directors, including the particularly pronounced influence of Jean Renoir, Josef Von Sternberg and Elia Kazan. Global in scope, timeless in influence and architectural in spirit: This is the legacy of Luchino Visconti._____________________________________________________
1952 Bellissima ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1957 Le notti bianche ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1960 Rocco e i suoi fratelli ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1963 Il gattopardo ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1965 Vaghe stelle dell'orsa... ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1967 Lo straniero ★★★★★★ (6/10)
1971 Morte a Venezia ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Writer
- Director
- Additional Crew
Valerio Zurlini was born on March 19, 1926. During his law studies in Rome, he started working in the theatre. In 1943, he joined the Italian resistance. Zurlini became a member of the Italian Communist Party. He filmed short documentaries in the immediate post-war period and in 1954 directed his first feature film, Le ragazze di San Frediano (1955), his only comedy. In 1958, together with Leonardo Benvenuti, Piero De Bernardi and Alberto Lattuada, he won the Silver Ribbon for Best Script for Lattuada's Guendalina (1957). Zurlini made his name as a director with his second feature film, Violent Summer (1959), starring Eleonora Rossi Drago and Jean-Louis Trintignant.
In 1961 Zurlini filmed Girl with a Suitcase (1961), a successful drama, starring Claudia Cardinale and Jacques Perrin, who would become Zurlini's favorite actor. In 1962 Zurlini's film Family Diary (1962) earned him the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival (it tied with Andrei Tarkovsky's Ivan's Childhood (1962)). Zurlini had a masterful skill for screen adaptations Both Le ragazze di San Frediano (1955) and Family Diary (1962) were based on Vasco Pratolini's work. Zurlini admired the work of Italian novelist Giorgio Bassani and hoped to adapt his novel "The Garden of the Finzi-Continis," which was subsequently directed by Vittorio De Sica (see The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (1970)). His 1965 film The Camp Followers (1965) was entered into the 4th Moscow International Film Festival where it won the Special Silver Prize. Zurlini's last film, The Desert of the Tartars (1976), produced by Jacques Perrin and featuring an all-star ensemble, was based on Dino Buzzati's novel of the same name. The movie won both the David di Donatello for Best Director and the Silver Ribbon for Best Director.
The visual style of Zurlini's adaptations was informed by artists Giorgio De Chirico, Giorgio Morandi and Ottone Rosai. During the last years of his life, Zurlini taught at the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia in Rome and worked as a dubbing director for the Italian versions for such movies as The Deer Hunter (1978) and My American Uncle (1980). He died of stomach hemorrhage in Verona on October 27, 1982._____________________________________________________
1955 Le ragazze di San Frediano ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1959 Estate violenta ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1961 La ragazza con la valigia ★★★★★★★★ (8/10)
1962 Cronaca familiare ★★★★★★★ (7/10)
1965 Le soldatesse ★★★★★★★ (7/10)- Writer
- Director
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Abandoning earlier studies in architecture and engineering, Luigi Zampa learned screenwriting and directing at the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia in Rome, between 1932 and 1937. He went on to make military training films for the Italian army during World War II, as well as collaborating on film scripts. He began to direct in 1941, initially 'rom-coms' (romantic comedies), though his subsequent work became increasingly influenced by his wartime experiences. This was particularly the case with his acclaimed anti-war film To Live in Peace (1947) ("Vivere in Pace"). His next success, Anni difficili (1948), examined Italy's recent history under the influence, first of the Nazis, and, subsequently, the Allies. Noted as one of the first Italian neo-realist film makers, he injected satire and political criticism into his studies of bourgeois mores and corruption. Zampa's post-1960 films again reverted to becoming more escapist, commercially oriented._____________________________________________________
1968 Le dolci signore ★★★★ (4/10)- Writer
- Director
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Giancarlo Zagni was born on 4 November 1926 in Bologna, Emilia-Romagna, Italy. He was a writer and director, known for La bellezza d'Ippolita (1962), Umorismo in nero (1965) and Testa di rapa (1966). He was married to Alida Valli. He died on 21 March 2013 in Rome, Lazio, Italy._____________________________________________________
1962 La bellezza d'Ippolita ★★★★★★ (6/10)