Discover Movies

2,909 Matches Found

Vajont '63: il coraggio di sopravvivere

At 10:39 PM of October 9, 1963, a landslide of 250 million cubic meters of land is detached from Mount Toc and falls into the artificial reservoir created by the Vajont dam, located in the northern mountains of the Veneto region (Italy). The landslide raises a hundred-meter-long wave that crosses the dam and within a few minutes falls on the Longarone village, at the foot of the dam. The country is completely destroyed. Nearly 2000 people in a few seconds pass from sleep to death. The film-documentary proposes, almost 50 years after the tragedy, one of the most serious European catastrophes since the post-war period to date. Within the documentary, different and significant are the testimonies of the protagonists of that dramatic event, which has destroyed entire countries and villages. The basis of the film is the extraordinary repertoire material, mostly unpublished. Also, inside the documentary, there is a touching testimony of Giampaolo Pansa, then sent to the Press.

Vajont '63: il coraggio di sopravvivere

NR 2008
Poeti

Biagio and Salvatore meet one morning by chance at the non-Catholic cemetery in Rome, where they have gone to visit Gregory Corso’s grave. They thus find themselves discussing poetry, modern times that have annulled the word, the nostalgia of “living in verse” and ask themselves if what happened in 1979 at Castelporziano will ever happen again, when authors from all over the world gathered in a great Woodstock of Poetry. Following the two poets on buses and subways, glimpses of walks and trips by car, all form an unusual description of Rome, a journey following the melancholy of the past and the uncertainty of the present, a sort of poetic tale.

Poeti

10.0 2009
Bread/Camellia's Square

Husband and wife Carlo and Grazia make bread in their wood-burning oven and also distribute it to the sellers. They work all night long, every day of the week, as their families used to do. They live in Gorgiti, a village in Tuscany, on the mountains near Arezzo. On the other hand, in Rome, some young people live near Camellia's Square at Centocelle, in the suburbs. We see them at different moments in their lives. Their existences seem to belong to distant and very different universes. There seems to be an irreconcilable generation conflict. The film makes use of documentary and fiction, but tries to amalgamate them while simultaneously using them as opposites.

Bread/Camellia's Square

NR 2008
Royal Opera House: La Traviata

Renée Fleming has matured into one of the finest sopranos around at the moment, a true star with a sparkling personality and a velvet-toned voice that is capable of wringing the finest emotions out of works by Strauss and Tchaikovsky that from a lesser singer could sound rather cold and clinical. I wouldn't have thought her voice would be so well suited to Violetta Valéry in La Traviata, and it does take some getting used to, but I think she at least brings a distinct quality to the role with an emotional heart that isn't always necessarily there when a leading diva uses it primarily as a display for her vocal talents. It's served well also by Antonio Pappano's conducting of the Royal Opera House Orchestra in a traditional, but effective production by Richard Eyre.

Royal Opera House: La Traviata

7.0 2009
Straub-Huillet e Pavese: Quei Loro Incontri

A film by Laura Vitali about the last work of the couple Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet in Buti (Italy) in May 2005, namely the staging of the last five "Dialogues with Leucò" by Cesare Pavese. In this sense, it is a moving testimony. Vitali alternates rehearsal sessions and interviews - by Jean-Marie Straub, Danièle Huillet and actors such as Giovanna Daddi, Angela Nugara and Andrea Bacci - who illuminate from the inside the methods of the two filmmakers and their relation to the work of Cesare Pavese, while situating the very special place that makes this work possible - the small town of Buti which warmly welcomed Straub and Huillet for a decade - and by bringing out the political dimension of their thought.

Straub-Huillet e Pavese: Quei Loro Incontri

NR 2005
The Color of Silence

The theatre company managed by Marco is passing through a crisis; the big networks invaded the market with their poor products and they lay down the law. Marco finds an important subject to work on: homosexuality; but it is hard to ask Federica, who is a writer and director, to work on it. That subject is a thorn in her side, as it was the cause of her marriage break up. Federica angerly refuses Marco's proposal, but after one night of searching, spent on Internet, she brings to light an aspect of the homosexuality, which doesn't want to give up, now: "The Pink Triangle" that means homosexuality as a martyrdom, the tribute of blood that homosexual people shed during the nazi period. Federica explains Marco and other actors of the company the new project, by telling the historical documentation. Each of them imagines his own character in dark colour performances, often brutal, following the line of blood that history has drawn.

The Color of Silence

1.0 2005
Turandot

Internationally acclaimed Chinese film-maker Chen Kaige delivers an opulent staging of the fairy-tale story of Chinese Princess Turandot, who will only marry a prince capable of solving her riddles. With sumptuous costumes and palace sets designed in China, Kaige's production adds a compellingly authentic accent to Puccini's exotic orchestral palette. Zubin Metha and his brilliant Orquestra de la Comunitet Valenciana offer "genuine foreworks of sound" (Wiener Zeitung), Maria Guleghina triumphs as Turandot. Recorded in 2008 at the Palau de les Arts in Valencia. Zubin Mehta (conductor).

Turandot

8.0 2008
The Hidden Angels of Luchino Visconti

“The Hidden Angels of Luchino Visconti” This is the title. It tells of the man, the great man and director that he was, through the eyes of his closest collaborators, through never-before-seen images of Mario Tursi’s personal photographic archives. He was the photographer who followed Visconti his entire life. In this documentary Visconti’s camera operators who have given back to us the vision of his genius and contributed to his greatness: in silence, without fanaticism or exaltation, and for this reason they are his “Hidden Angels”.

The Hidden Angels of Luchino Visconti

6.0 2008
The Metropolitan Opera: Puccini's La Rondine

This elegant romance is the least-known work of the mature Giacomo Puccini . The story concerns a kept woman who defies convention to chase a dream of romantic love with an earnest, if naïve, young man. This Met Opera production features the dynamic soprano Angela Gheorghiu and Frenchborn tenor Roberto Alagna performing the roles of Magda and Ruggero, it blooms into its rightful place in the glorious Puccini canon. La Rondine (The Swallow) was commissioned by Vienna s Carltheater in 1913. Due to the impending outbreak of World War I, premiered in 1917, at the Opéra de Monte-Carlo with Gilda Dalla Rizza and Tito Schipa. Set in a Parisian salon, it is the story of Magda, the glamorous mistress of wealthy banker Rambaldo. Her yearning for romantic love compels her into the arms of the ardent and adoring young Ruggero.

The Metropolitan Opera: Puccini's La Rondine

8.0 2009
Donizetti: L'elisir d'amore

Donizetti's L'Elisir d'Amore is one of the staples of the comic opera repertory. The plot hinges on whether earnest but dim-witted Nemorino will snag Adina, the flirtatious heroine. She's a tease who takes up with Belcore, an army sergeant, to make Nemorino jealous. After numerous (and humorous) plot twists that include a phony love potion, it all ends happily. Adina and Nemorino declare their love for each other, Belcore is dumped, and the fraudulent Dulcamara does a landslide business in love potions. It's all a fast-moving bundle of fun, especially with the star-filled cast of this 2005 Vienna State Opera performance.

Donizetti: L'elisir d'amore

8.5 2005