Italy

  • Giuseppe Patroni Griffi – Identikit AKA The Driver’s Seat (1974)

    Giuseppe Patroni Griffi1971-1980DramaItalyThriller
    Identikit (1974)
    Identikit (1974)

    In what remains the most obscure, bizarre and wildly misunderstood film of her entire career – and perhaps even ‘70s Italian cinema – Elizabeth Taylor stars as a disturbed woman who arrives in Rome to find a city fragmented by autocratic law, leftist violence and her own increasingly unhinged mission to find the most dangerous liaison of all. Academy Award nominee Ian Bannen (THE OFFENCE), Mona Washbourne (THE COLLECTOR) and Andy Warhol co-star in this “unique, hallucinatory neo noir” (Cult Film Freaks) – barely released in America as THE DRIVER’S SEAT – directed by Giuseppe Patroni Griffi (‘TIS PITY SHE’S A WHORE), adapted from the unnerving novella by Muriel Spark (The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie) and featuring cinematography by three-time Oscar winner Vittorio Storaro.Read More »

  • Massimo Dallamano – La Fine dell’Innocenza AKA Blue Belle (1976)

    Massimo Dallamano1971-1980EroticaExploitationItaly
    La Fine dell'Innocenza (1976)
    La Fine dell’Innocenza (1976)

    Annie, the mistress of a middle-aged financier, accompanies him on a trip to Hong Kong. When his business interests collapse Annie ends up destitute. She is befriended by a group of socialites and begins her rite of passage in their world.Read More »

  • Giorgio Ferroni – Tombolo, paradiso nero (1947)

    Giorgio Ferroni1941-1950DramaItalian Neo-RealismItaly
    Tombolo, paradiso nero (1947)
    Tombolo, paradiso nero (1947)

    Quote:
    Tombolo, paradiso nero is a 1947 film directed by Giorgio Ferroni. Inspired by an article by Indro Montanelli, the film depicts the undergrowth of smugglers, prostitutes and deserters from the post-war Pineta del Tombolo, when the US military was stationed in the area.Read More »

  • Nicolò Bongiorno – Songs of the Water Spirits (2020)

    2011-2020DocumentaryItalyNicolò Bongiorno
    Songs of the Water Spirits (2020)
    Songs of the Water Spirits (2020)

    The challenge of a society set in the breathtaking mountains of the Himalaya’s against environmental degradation. Can the quest for a “glocal” way of living projected towards an “ancient future” inspire the Western economies of our planet?Read More »

  • Joe D’Amato – Il Porno shop della settima strada AKA The Pleasure Shop on 7th Avenue (1979)

    Joe D'Amato1971-1980CrimeEroticaItaly
    Il Porno shop della settima strada (1979)
    Il Porno shop della settima strada (1979)

    synopsis: Two amateur armed robbers steal $5,000 from NY’s red light district, only to discover it was an intended protection payment to the mob. With Mafia hit men after them they seek shelter in a sleazy sex shop.Read More »

  • Bruno Corbucci – Assassinio sul Tevere AKA Assassination on the Tiber (1979)

    1971-1980Bruno CorbucciComedyCrimeItaly
    Assassinio sul Tevere (1979)
    Assassinio sul Tevere (1979)

    A black-out occurs during the meeting of a gang of criminals. When the light is back one of them is found killed with a stab on his back and all the clues point to a penniless man who had an argument with the victim a short time before the murder.Read More »

  • Sergio Sollima – Il corsaro nero AKA The Black Corsair (1976)

    Sergio Sollima1971-1980ActionAdventureItaly
    Il corsaro nero (1976)
    Il corsaro nero (1976)

    Quote:
    Emilio di Roccabruna count of Ventimiglia is fighting Van Gould who ten years before had killed his father and stolen his family properties. He is known as “Il Corsaro Nero” (The Black Corsair) and his two brothers as Il Corsaro Verde (The Green Corsair) and as Il Corsaro Rosso (The Red Corsair). But the Green Corsair and the Red Corsair are killed treacherously by Van Gould’s men while the Black Corsair is entirely taken up by saving an Indian village from the Spaniards. He can save only Yara. Later on he organizes with the help of Morgan his revenge.Read More »

  • Alberto Lattuada – La steppa (1962)

    Alberto Lattuada1961-1970ClassicsDramaItaly
    La steppa (1962)
    La steppa (1962)

    This is a lovely colorful adaptation of a novel by Anton Chekhov about the adventures of Jegoruska, an eight-year-old Russian boy, in a journey across the “steppe” or open plains of Russia on the en route from his home village to a market city where he is to go to school. It is in a way an allegorical trip which exposes him to some of the grimmest realities of life and some of its better ones. We get a social message as well, for example, the harsh conditions of the peasantry of 19th Century Russia. The director Alberto Lattuada often adapted Russian works or made films with Russian settings as in CUORE DI CANE, THE TEMPEST, and THE OVERCOAT. Most of the location scenes here were shot in Yugoslavia. The cast, which includes Charles Vanel as a priest and Marina Vlady as a countess, are uniformly good. Handsome young Daniele Spallone as the boy is marvelous.Read More »

  • Federico Fellini – E la nave va aka And The Ship Sails On (1983)

    Federico Fellini1981-1990DramaItaly
    E la nave va (1983)
    E la nave va (1983)

    Quote:
    In And the Ship Sails On, I needed a large exterior to paint, so I used the wall of the Pantanella pasta factory. It was where my father, Urbano Fellini, had worked when he passed through Rome on his way back from forced labor in Belgium after World War I. It was while at the pasta factory in 1918 that he met my mother, Ida Barbiani, and carried her off, not on a white charger, but in a third-class coach on the train, with her full consent, away from her home, family, and social class in Rome.Read More »

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