Discoveries from Italy World Cinema

Young swain Toto Esposito tries to abduct his beloved to marry her, but he makes a mistake: he kidnaps an ugly woman named Carmela, who loves him--and chases him when he escapes.

Francesco and Claudia are best friends. They're inseparable and tell each other everything, until another man enters the picture stealing Claudia's heart. Francesco then realizes that friendship between man and woman is a complicated thing.

An Anglo-American indie rock band winds up stranded in Epecuén, where their internal conflicts and the bad luck of their tour quickly lose importance before the hell that awaits them.

Ugo meets the 18-year-old Renata in the hostel where she is staying. He falls in love with and leaves with her for several romantic places until the money ends. Ugo will try to get the girl engaged on a local TV station, but Renata falls in love with a manager.

The story of a hideous monster who takes the form of a beautiful, seductive woman who in a torrent of special effects, beauty and monster transform into a climax of pure evil. For years this monster woman has cursed a small village, and to this day her deadly grasps holds the peaceful residents in fear. This ferocious, feminine fury possesses a shocking sensual appetite and she can only satisfy her lust when passion consumes her, by striking where a man is most vulnerable.... and the results are deadly!

When Nico returns from overseas to say farewell to his ailing mother, he discovers something monstrous is happening in the small town he once called home. As the list of grizzly murder victims begins to grow and the authorities fear the killer is a beast unlike anything they have ever seen, Nico senses a savage transformation within himself and uncovers the terrifying secret his family could never reveal.

Political activist Salvatore returns to his native Sicily and stirs up trouble among the peasants, urging them to confront the Mafia and demand the right to plough their own fields. The peasants refuse to help him, and Salvatore is marked by the Mafia as a troublemaker.

Luciano Pavarotti brings his spectacular voice and artistry to one of the most famous of all tenor roles—Manrico, the ardent troubadour, trapped in an impossible situation by forces beyond his control. The sensational Dolora Zajick, only days after her Met debut, gives an incandescent performance as the demented gypsy Azucena, thirsting for revenge against Count Di Luna (Sherrill Milnes). Eva Marton is the passionate Leonora, desired by both Manrico and the Count, and James Levine brilliantly leads the Met’s orchestra and chorus in some of Verdi’s best-known music.

Has been an year since Pietro Zinni's gang got caught in the Sopox production laboratory and each of them locked up in different jails. From Regina Coeli jail, Pietro keep warning the authorities a fool syntetized nerve gas and he is ready to make a killing, but no one takes him seriously.

Bianca is 23 years old, and it already feels like too much. She has left her parents' home and is supposed to attend university, but she never goes. She has a few specific obsessions: the passing of time, cocaine, and Angelica. Since they started living together, everything seems to move faster, spiraling downwards. Even their friendship stumbles into addiction and becomes confused with love. Bianca keeps a notebook, jotting down notes for her books. Still, she wishes she could write everything in it: that youth is painful and already slipping away, that friendship breaks your heart, and that we constantly lose everything — and yet, maybe, in the end — between the night streets of Rome, the boys of Naples, and the tree that stands silently, visible through the window — nothing will be truly lost.

A story about a widow who begins to receive blackmail letters demanding money from her. This is when everyone in the small town she lives in dismissing her husband.

Three friends live together in the house owned by one of them - and look for happiness

It’s a hard life for young Leo: his family just doesn’t understand why he’s a vegetarian lion. His solitude ends when he meets Avoria, the elephant queen, who has recently given birth to two calves with braided tails. Mysteriously widowed, Avoria is courted by dapper Zanco. By a series of misfortunes she is separated from her young. Leo steps in to take care of them: thus begins his search for legendary Milk Lake, during which he experiences all sorts of incredible adventures. This fable with a happy ending handles the themes of diversity and racism with engaging originality.

Alberto, a newspaper man, tries a one-time shot of living the good life with the help of his penniless mentor.

A dramatic and penetrating examination of the intellectual and moral standards existing at Oxford University, England, in the early 1970s.

To save his crumbling and rapidly-depopulating rural town, its mayor fakes a gruesome murder to attract media attention. His plan initially succeeds, but soon the situation will spiral out of control.

A fanciful biopic of legendary conductor Arturo Toscanini as a very young man.

Rimini, 1991. For more than a year, the uno bianca gang - they always use a white Fiat Uno - has plagued the area. Their crimes are violent, sometimes killing carabineri, and there's no particular pattern: a bank one day, a petrol station the next, extortion of a small business the next. Are they terrorists? A foreign gang? Tied to the Mafia? After a particularly bloody shootout, two detectives are assigned to start fresh: they go through the notebooks of previous investigators and they interview a few witnesses again. They find a pattern in the crimes and predict the next assault, but the special task force in Bologna is dismissive. Can they carry on alone; how far will they get?

It is 1945. Enrico Piaggio’s Pontedera factory is in ruins and the 12,000 people who worked there are condemned to unemployment and misery. Piaggio feels the enormous responsibility resting on his shoulders: the lives of so many families depend on his ability to create new jobs. A project is born in the mind of the entrepreneur: a small, robust, agile and affordable means of transport, capable of relaunching mobility, giving impetus to the recovery of the country’s economic and civil life. To make this dream come true, Piaggio turns to engineer Corradino D’Ascanio, a brilliant designer who uses the experience gained in the field of aeronautics to create the scooter that remains today the symbol of Italian creativity and design: the Vespa!

Starblack is a hero who dresses in black and his face is covered by a black scarf and he carries in his shirt a black star, which he always leaves at the scene of his enterprises, as a symbol of justice.

Ray Lovelock stars as Massimo, a young undercover cop with a taste for violence and a thirst for revenge! Massimo gets himself arrested and quickly infiltrates the ranks of the underworld figure serving a sentence. Eventually a breakout is planned and Massimo is to be included. Just about as soon as they hit the street an attempt is made on the boss' (Martin Balsam) life. Massimo acts quickly in helping to save him and that's the in he has been waiting for

Omar Sultan's army has been defeated. However, Prince Said, son of the Sultan died, encourages people to form an army and fight again to Ibrahim. The town gets excited and running quickly, while crossing the desert, they encounter the enemy caravans and raid without knowing that one of them is Fatima, daughter of Ibrahim, who poses as a singer of the harem. Said, dazzled by the beauty of the girl, released. But soon after, Fatima, who also doesn´t know the origin of the robber, sees him again, and among them born a strong attraction.

Fresh out prison, Tiberio reconnects with his old partners in crime, Michele Ferribote and Peppe the Panther, only to realise that a lot has changed--including crime--after twenty years. Can he cope with this new reality?

Baron Osvaldo Lambertenghi is forced to sell his ancestral castle, staying on as a bellboy when it's converted into a hotel. However he becomes vampirized when his mysterious uncle comes to stay.

Tommaso has just left his first wife but he will meet a new person who will change everything in his life.

Italy, 1972. Political elections are taking place and Christian Democrat victory is expected; but the electronic computer of the Ministry of the Interior reveals that the party with the highest number is the Italian Communist Party.

Two segments: In the first one Felice, a baritone who has had to give up his career because of a heart condition and now works as an accountant at the Opera, inexplicably spends his nights laughing in his sleep. When his best friend, a cripple, takes his life and his wife abandons him Felice decides to die himself. In the second segment two kidnappings in Sicily, the second of which took place a century before the present one, are compared.

A rich count invites a theatre troupe to his home on an isolated island... but soon people start getting murdered. Has the family curse struck again?

Marco Ferretti is an Italian manager who is young and beautiful, but he cannot stand the presence of women after a difficult affair. When Marco goes to London for an appointment, he meets four beautiful girls who disrupt his life with love.

In the beginning of the 20th. century Italian actor Guido Guidi, more enthusiastic than talented, and his ensemble tour Texas. The mysterious and obviously rich Peppino Garibaldi gives them an offer, they can’t deny: For a large amount of dough they should play “Richard III.” in the Mexican town Vera Cruz. But Peppino is not really interested in cultural affairs: He supports “La Revolución” and “General” Carasco, who utilizes the feastful premiere of “Richard III.” to raid Vera Cruz for Comandante Zapata. But shortly after the Mexican Army shows up with some canons in tow to sort things out. Guidi and Padre Albino, Italian like him, succeed to flee and save Carasco accidentially from the firing squad. Whereas the latter coninues his revolutionary fight, Guidi and Albino start an odyssey through the struggling Mexico, which lets them fall one time in the hands of Carasco the other time in those of Herrera or even in the clutches of “hand-taking” bandidos.

King Minos sacrifices the 'required' virgins to the Minotaur. As his wife lies dying, she confesses that her daughter has a twin she has secreted to avoid giving one of the girls to the Minotaur. The daughter raised by Minos tries to have her twin killed, but failing in her first attempt, continues to try to have her given to the Minotaur. Theseus, the Greek hero, tries to prevent it.

Smeralda Amadier, a retired singer, lives in an isolated villa with her secretary Marcella and her lover Didier (but throws out the latter after catching him with another woman). Smeralda has huge debts and when creditors threaten her with bankruptcy she decides to sell her valuable jewels. That evening, she meets Costas, a handsome young man who seduces her. Next morning, there is no sign of him or the jewels. He was apparently a penniless gigolo, but who was his secret partner in the theft?

Fun adventures of a taxi driver and his passenger, a broken financial genius.

A number of different segments taken from 19th century Italian stories.

Rubina arrives in Rome from the high mountain in search of her boyfriend Carlo, who refuses to keep her word of marriage, in view of which she falsely accuses him of having raped her and the boy is imprisoned. Rubina is placed as a maid in David's house. David who has a bizarre family runs a boutique with his son Leo. She soon becomes a clerk in the store, where she conquers everyone, and marries Leo. She will have various sexual experiences. But she gets pregnant by her boyfriend who has since been released from prison.

Elena is a beautiful, 35-year-old accomplished woman who has an unhealthy obsession with perfection. Elena's well-ordered life is thrown into chaos, however, when she meets Adriana, an 18-year-old seductive young woman who offers passion and excitement, and Hector, an older man who offers Elena stability and security. Elena quickly realizes though that Adriana is too immature and too young for her, so she tries to end their romance, but for Adriana the rejection is just another game to play

Professor Ricardo Rossi is an uncompromising moralist and a paladin of Catholic morals. He is understandably baffled when he finds his wife Elisa in bed with another woman (whom Rossi mistakens for a man). Furious, he poisons his wife and throws her body into a lake, then brings home a prostitute, Eva, to replace her. He also begins an affair with his niece Barbara. But Elisa is not dead, as Rossi soon finds and she is plotting with Eva to get rid of him. Rossi is more precise this time and shoots the two women dead. However, there is a complication and more deaths ensue...

During a summer weekend in the island of Panarea, a series of stories of love between the vacationers are intertwined.

In an imaginary northern European country during the High Middle Ages, two leaders of a barbarian village fight to gain power: one is good and right and the other is an evil selfish. Who will have it?

An alien civilization, which facing eminent extinction, kidnaps two famous genetic scientists from Earth. A troop of soldiers is dispatched to combat the humanoid robots and rescue the victims.

Loosely based on the notorious Richard Speck murders, this is the grim tale of a disturbed Vietnam vet returning home via Belfast, who invades a house shared by eight nurses and proceeds to terrorize and murder them.

In 19th-century Italy, Giacomo Leopardi channels his debilitating illness and isolation into poetry.

Rome 2003, the camera follows citizens of Rome. Night, in a flat, a woman prepares her husband's lunch. The man takes a bus, but the camera follow another bus ... a woman cleans the mayor's office... A man interviews passengers on a bus about immigration...... the owner of a bar is racist person... a survivor woman of Holocaust remembers the Ghetto deportation... deportation that is filmed by a director... Stefania Sandrelli plays with her grand daughter in a park a man tries to seduce the bus driver...gay night life... sunrise at Piazza Navona, a noble man and a tramp are sitting together. - - - Gente di Roma is a 2003 Italian comedy mockumentary film directed by Ettore Scola. It is close to Federico Fellini's Roma. The film is dedicated to Alberto Sordi, who Scola wanted to close the film, as a noble man, but he could not film him because he died. Scola's daughters helped to co-write the script. (From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Maciste arranges for himself and his new friend Bangor to be captured by a mysterious band of white-clad marauders and taken to an underground city. There the two are forced to turn an enormous wheel along with other captives as part of a gold-and-diamonds mining operation. The underground city's queen, Halis Mosab, takes note of the handsome, muscular Maciste and chooses him to be her consort if he can meet such challenges as saving the kidnapped Princess Saliura from a gigantic ape. Maciste kills the ape and carries Saliura back to the aboveground world. The white-clad marauders can't follow them if it means being caught in the sunlight which instantly dissolves them. Maciste then returns to the underground city to save the other captives. Meanwhile, high priest Kahab informs his son, Katar, that their queen is not one of them but, unbeknownst to her, was kidnapped as a small child from the "world above." If Katar can marry her...

Elementary school teacher Michele Cortese is about to start a whole new life. After 40 years of teaching in the metropolitan Roman jungle, he had to move to a village in Central Italy, to teach in a tiny school with just a few children aged 7-10. Struggling to overcome his urban inadequacy, he finds a friendly face in vice-principal Agnese and gradually manages to fit in, thanks to her and their spirited pupils. As everything seems to be falling into place, unwelcome news comes through: the school has failed to meet its student quota for the next year and will soon be shut for good.

In 1976, when he was just 19 years old, Massimo Carlotto was accused of a murder of which he was the sole witness. As a result of this accusation, he faced 11 trials, spent 6 years in prison, and 5 years on the run. His legal ordeal lasted 18 years and ended in 1993 when the President of the Republic granted him a pardon.

Zenabel, a young woman from a humble background, discovers that she is actually the daughter of a Spanish nobleman who was killed by a ruthless don, Alonso, who took the title. So Zenable assembles a group of misfit friends to reclaim her title.

Documentary film making at its best as it narrates very exotic and esoteric rituals of the primitive peoples of Africa.

When war erupts in Ukraine, three women from different worlds collide at the Romanian border: an Italian woman searching for her missing husband and unborn child, a Romanian mother fighting to save her daughter, and a young Ukrainian surrogate forced to choose between survival and motherhood. Blending documentary reality with fiction, the film explores resilience, sacrifice, and the fragile bonds that emerge in times of conflict.

In a forgotten railway outpost, a humble stationmaster meets a glamorous society woman. Their brief wait for her train turns unexpectedly intimate—until her fiancé arrives, and the night erupts into a desperate struggle as he tries to drag her back by force.

Guido, an acclaimed writer, leads a seemingly perfect life with his wife and daughter, but his restless search for inspiration leads him into the arms of Giulia, a charming and mysterious swim instructor who's hiding a secret.

Historical drama, based upon the novel by Alessandro Manzoni.

Luciana is a factory worker married to the love of her life. She is living the simple and quiet life she’s always desired: she works and she is deeply in love with her husband Stefano, even if he doesn’t always have a job and they both need to struggle to keep on going. They are happy and always on each other’s side, but shortly after she finds out she’s pregnant, she gets fired and her world starts falling apart. After having tried to have a baby for years, the joy of impending motherhood lasts only a few months. Begging for help but with no one ready to listen to her, completely desperate and shattered, Luciana decides to kidnap the managing director of her former company, asking for the justice she deserves.

The story is about a young hippy called Salvatore who sparks up a relationship with a high class prostitute, Maddalena. The two fall in love and try to start a new life together but things turn ugly when Maddalena is kidnapped by his old hippy pals and Maddalena's dangerous pimp...

The year is 2047. Our planet is ruled by the repressive Confederate Central Government (CCG). Ryan is a Green War rebel agent sent on a mission by Sponge to collect evidence against the CCG for its heinous crimes. Ryan soon faces the sinister Colonel Asimov, Major Anderson and a group of mercenaries lead by Lobo. His mission quickly turns chaotic when he meets Tuage, a mutant survivor of the CCG rebellion who swears to help Ryan save what is left of their world … or does she?

In the harsh snowy landscape of the Italian Alps, a young technician arrives to repair an electric power plant of a village plagued by blackouts. There, he encounters a strange disappearance.

A masseur for ladies wins the reputation of seducer and many customers try to verify. Classic of Italian sexy comedy.