Discoveries from Italy World Cinema

Novel writer, widow for about a year, decides to finish her latest story. Unfortunately, the memory of her husband is so strong as to imprison her in her story. It will be the protagonist of her book to transport her within the memories of her that still bind her to her ex-partner.

A couple of hippies are searching for Joe, a long time friend from the 70s who seem to be stuck in time and never aged a day since then. Through technicolor ninjas, bizarre metalheads, shamans and ancient rituals, the two embark on a journey with no turning back.

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.

Anna is 13, on the keyboard of the piano she should learn to play are her tricks stolen from her mother. Her meeting with Peppino and Mariuolo will make her to take the step that separates childhood from the future.

A woman recovering from the death of her husband suspects that her house has been invaded by demonic spirits. She summons a paranormal expert to help her get rid of them.

The two drivers Giovanni and Gaetano are friends. Gaetano, bold and ruthless, thrives in the black market, while Giovanni, who is a naive and fundamentally honest worker from the North of Italy, cannot get any profit and his wife, an energetic and talkative Roman woman, can't help blaming him for his poor business skills. Returning from a trip to Naples, he brings home a little hungry orphan, Nello. At first Giovanni's wife doesn't want the boy, but then she begins to like him. The little boy does whatever he can to help the family. Nello's father, who everybody thought to have died during the war, finds his little son and, being a rich business man, he employs the good and generous Giovanni. Meanwhile the former friend Gaetano is caught by the police and convicted for his illegal trades.

Fleeing Troy in the wake of its destruction, fair-faced Helen and her faithful protector Arion run into the pharaoh Ramses, who sets his sights on Helen -- and is subsequently murdered. Now it's up to Arion to save Helen from those who wish her dead.

Joseph Ratzinger (Benedict XVI) is now in top form and wants to run for Pope again. Therefore, he relies on his exuberant manager for the media relaunch that he has always dreamed of.

Claudia and Flavio were once passionately in love, but all of that is over. Now, in their fifties, they must venture anew into the world of love and dating once more but for Claudia confronting the end and accepting a new beginning isn’t so easy. Claudia is unwilling to let go and forget the life she’s built with Flavio, while Flavio, eager to move on, soon finds himself in a relationship with a much younger woman. Claudia soon reconnects with Nina, a student from her days as a professor.

Francesca, Paola, Laura, and Alicia are four friends who all fall in love with the same man, a musician named Gigi. Alicia is a woman who fears compromising in her relationships, Laura is an overprotected dreamer, Paola is a lawyer who seeks true love, and Francesca is a dancer on a TV show

A love, a journey, perhaps an obsession, the thin line between life and death constantly questioned by love, an immortal feeling, yet experienced by mortals. This animated and musical short film features young Orpheus, the quintessential archetype of the poet, embarking on a journey that will lead him into the depths of the underworld, in a desperate attempt to bring his deceased wife Eurydice back to life

The artist Rä di Martino celebrates MAS, Rome's historic "people's warehouses," with a documentary that blurs the lines between reality and fiction.

A comedy set behind the scenes at Cinecittà studios in Rome during the war, focusing on a famous, demanding tenor and his love interest.

14-year-old Siddharta, wise beyond his age, has to deal every day with his heroin-addict mother Silvia and an absent father. One day, his four-year-old sister Domitilla accidentally pricks her finger on one of Silvia's used needles without her noticing. Seeking advice on the Internet, Siddharta is told to have her tested for hepatitis and AIDS. Thus he embarks on a odyssey of medical bureaucracy and both kind and uncaring adults.

An Italian WWII documentary by a group of neorealists.

A young man sentenced to death manages to postpone his execution because of the impending wedding of his poor sister, who is to be married off. His best friend vouches for his return. After taking care of his sister, the young man hurries back, but is delayed by numerous unexpected obstacles. Nevertheless, he continues the journey, determined to join his now-presumably dead friend.

Three reckless robbers target a chinese mafia club. They do not know, however, that the bartender, the only one who knows the safe combination, is narcoleptic and falls asleep suddenly when he gets too emotional...

Grand Duchy of Wallenstein. Elsa Holbein is the young beautiful daughter of General Julius, the Chief of the General Staff. After a spy named Moise Sthar steals military documents, Julius is accused of betrayal. He kills himself while Elsa is forced to leave. Homeless, she begins wandering the streets until, on the Riviera, she starts her performing career under the pseudonym of Diana Cadouleur and becomes a successful actress and singer. One day, in a small church, she meets an elegant young man and she falls in love with him. But during a tour on the Lucarno Lake she runs into Sthar who, rejected by Elena, spreads rumors about Prince Massimiliano’s behavior.

A man entertains briefly the idea that suffering can't be counted, that two who suffer are not more than one who suffers. Adapted from the book: "Visit to Hades: Auschwitz and Breslau" (1966) by Günther Anders.

A shy and insecure girl becomes a social media idol thanks to the selfies taken by her smartphone that portray her as beautiful. However, all this will soon have a macabre price: like a modern Dorian Gray with a digital portrait, with each new shot the phone’s camera will steal a little piece of her lifeblood.

Roger Blanchard has a busy life. On the family side, he is married and has two children, aged ten and fifteen. On the work side, he holds an important position at the Ministry of Culture. To bolster his social status, he has a mistress to liven up his Saturdays. But nothing is going right. His wife Marion exasperates him, his children irritate him, his job gives him no real satisfaction, his mistress neglects him and his superior, Monsieur Gambaud, gets on his nerves. But when he meets a beautiful young secretary, his life and habits are turned upside down: Blanchard amuses him and gets his way. In revenge, Gambaud warns Blanchard's wife.

408 AD. The Visigoths led by Alaric invade northern Italy. At Ravenna, they have to battle, and they are stopped by the power of the Roman legions and the cunning of the emperor's sister, Galla Placidia. As the Goths lose many warriors in the cruel battle, Alaric vows bloody revenge.

Davide and Loris are brothers and live in a very small village in the north of Italy. While Davide is eighteen years old and gay, Loris is almost thirty and doesn't know anything about his brother's sexuality.

Peppino, a fishmonger on Campo de' Fiori, a famous Roman marketplace, works alongside Elide, a greengrocer, who has a soft spot for him, despite the fact they argue all day long... But neither Peppino, nor his friend Aurelio, the barber, are interested in getting married. Until he meets the beautiful Elsa...

Anyone who has ever ventured to the "Land of the Deafs" will have been struck by the strangeness of the choreographed signs with which deaf people express themselves. Developed ages ago, these signs constitute a veritable language. As precise and subtle as speech, they are as effective as spoken language in making a declaration love or providing a detailed technical description. Jean-Claude, Jeanine, Eric, Cyril, Alain, Juliette, Guy, Aurélien and René have one thing in common - they are all profoundly deaf. So they dream, think and communicate in sign language. Which means that they see the world differently. Viewers embark with them on a discovery of the distant land of the deaf, where sight and touch assume enormous importance.

On the 1991 European Basketball Championship an incredible event occured. A team of some of the greatest Balkan basketball stars accepted gold and watched the flag of their country be lifted up. The flag of a country that no longer existed.

The lawyer Pio has the personality of an earthworm. The priest assigns him, as a driver, the rather prejudiced Amedeo, rough manners and unlikely clothes. The second will wake up the first.

The film is set in 1941 during the Second World War, when the city of Benghazi in Italian-ruled Libya was occupied by British forces. Italian inhabitants of Benghazi work to resist the British and discover their military plans. One man, Captain Enrico Berti, appears to be collaborating with the British but is in fact working undercover for Italian intelligence. The film ends with the city being recaptured by Italian troops and their Nazi German allies.

IL CAMPANELLO DI NOTTE, Farce in one act by Gaetano Donizetti, is set in Naples. Don Annibale Pistacchio, an old apothecary, have just married the young Serafina. Enrico, former lover of Serafina, interrupts constantly the wedding night showing on several disguises and calling at Pistacchio's drugstore by ringing the night bell, asking the unfortunate groom a preposterous list of prescriptions.

Grieving and thirsting for justice for the murder of her father, committed by her mother Clytemnestra and her lover Aegisthus, Electra, together with her brother Orestes, embarks on a path of suffering in which there is no room for remorse or repentance, culminating in irrevocable decisions. Directed by Roberto Andò.

A 1983 Italian film.

Luciano Emmer and his love for art history, accompanied by Enrico Ghezzi. A journey through the historical and artistic memory of the great director, immersed in the recollection of the images he produced and loved throughout his long career.

In order to persuade the Emperor to spare his village, the mighty Ursus is forced to fight the greatest gladiator in Rome in the Roman Arena.

Carla, a young postal worker in Havana, spends her days postmarking thousands of letters and dreaming of the day when she can be reunited with her parents, who moved to Miami when she was fifteen. To fulfill her longing for intimacy, she opens random letters and rewrites them into lyrical prose, believing she is helping her fellow Cubans understand one another better. Beautifully filmed in black and white accented by brilliant colours, Nada+ has a stunning visual composition. With its delightful mix of visual humour, theatrical characters, satire and a lighthearted love story, it has a distinctly Cuban flair.

While traveling by car, Alex witnesses a murder. Together with his partner, he wants to find out who the victim is and what lies behind a strange check won during a poker game.

This brisk, engaging documentary surveys the life, work, and legacy of Vittorio Gassman, the Italian screen icon who began his illustrious career as a serious dramatic stage actor before going on to subvert that image in classic works of commedia all’italiana by Mario Monicelli (Big Deal on Madonna Street), Dino Risi (Il Sorpasso), and Ettore Scola (We All Loved Each Other So Much). Through a wealth of interviews, film clips, and archival footage, Sono Gassman! reveals how Gassman’s comedic screen persona cannily reflected and critiqued mid-20th-century Italian society, while shedding light on the complex inner life of the man himself.

When his girlfriend falls for a rich entrepreneur, an aspiring singer plots with the man's girlfriend so that they can get back their respective partners.

Francesca, a magistrate, seems happily married to a successful and wealthy engineer. They prepare to spend a holiday together when Francesca is instructed to shed light on the mysterious death of a girl, Rosa Franceschi, who threw herself from the terrace of her house. Francesca interrogates friends and neighbours of the victim, especially Veronica Marini who, living opposite the victim's apartment, followed the whole story. This is how she discovers her husband's affair with Rosa Franceschi and her involvement in the girl's suicide or murder.

This short documentary explores the world of Italian photo comics (fumetti), focusing on the models who posed as romantic heroes and heroines for popular illustrated stories. By contrasting their staged screen personas with their everyday lives, the film offers an observational look at a mass-culture phenomenon in postwar Italy.

Blind and wandering, Oedipus arrives in Colonus, near Athens, supported by Antigone and then also by Ismene. Everyone avoided him, but now everyone seeks him, because the city that will have his tomb will be invincible, according to the oracles. Oedipus drives everyone away and, accompanied by the Athenian king Theseus, sets off towards death. Directed by Robert Carsen.

A tale on the Italian upper class of the '60s and their ways to kill time.

Sergio driving a taxi in a white Naples overflowing sadness and garbage. Pouring rain leads her clients through the city trying to process the death of his brother, who started ten years earlier for Tibet and never returned. A pop singer, a recycler of fragments of life, a radio announcer, an old uncle, alternate seats on its bearing, each in its own way, a trace of his brother loved. Stubborn not to go over and get lost in an endless race, Sergio is overwhelmed by memories and the music produced in pairs with Alfredo, which in Buddhism and in its foundations had found the strength to cope with the disease. Those notes that he believed buried and laid to always return overbearing and demanding a soundboard that resonate and express his being sound. Putting his hand on the piano, Sergio Alfredo feel again, giving the past with the present and realizing itself in the feeling.

A promising law student from a good family is driven by a cool cardsharper into a downward spiral of criminality, discovering a part of himself he had never known.