Think, “I Was a Teenage Empress.” A trio of movies tell an optimized version of the life of a 19th century Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary. It’s fuzzy history designed to prop up German morale, but the film is graced with the incredible presence of a teenaged Romy Schneider, whose beauty and personality became a sensation in the European film world.
The Sissi Collection:
Sissi
Sissi The Young Empress
Sissi The Fateful Years of an Empress
The Story of Vickie
Blu-ray
Film Movement
1955, 1956, 1957 / Color / 1:78 widescreen & 1:33 flat full frame / 102, 107, 109 min. / Street Date November 14, 2017 / 74.95
Starring: Romy Schneider, Karlheinz Böhm, Magda Schneider, Uta Franz, Vilma Degischer, Josef Meinrad, Gustav Knuth.
Cinematography: Bruno Mondi
Film Editor: Alfred Srp
Original Music: Anton Profes
Produced by Karl Erlich, Ernst Marischka
Written and Directed by Ernst Marischka
I’m fascinated by National Epics, movies that individual countries might take as a film...
The Sissi Collection:
Sissi
Sissi The Young Empress
Sissi The Fateful Years of an Empress
The Story of Vickie
Blu-ray
Film Movement
1955, 1956, 1957 / Color / 1:78 widescreen & 1:33 flat full frame / 102, 107, 109 min. / Street Date November 14, 2017 / 74.95
Starring: Romy Schneider, Karlheinz Böhm, Magda Schneider, Uta Franz, Vilma Degischer, Josef Meinrad, Gustav Knuth.
Cinematography: Bruno Mondi
Film Editor: Alfred Srp
Original Music: Anton Profes
Produced by Karl Erlich, Ernst Marischka
Written and Directed by Ernst Marischka
I’m fascinated by National Epics, movies that individual countries might take as a film...
- 11/14/2017
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
We all, on some level, regret aging because we fear dying, but there’s something especially poignant about watching artists who celebrated vitality grapple with their mortality. It’s one thing to watch Bergman or Woody Allen settle into their later years, having seen them grapple with those subjects their entire careers. It’s quite another when an artist who once seemed to defy death’s grip can no longer avoid it.
Conversation Piece was Luchino Visconti’s penultimate film, released a little more than a year before his death. He was only 67, and had already suffered a stroke. Remarkable in its formal construction, you can nevertheless feel his regrets, his fears, his very life coming to the fore through his protagonist, a retired professor played by Burt Lancaster. So solitary is his existence that he isn’t even given a name. He’s content in his Italian apartment, taking...
Conversation Piece was Luchino Visconti’s penultimate film, released a little more than a year before his death. He was only 67, and had already suffered a stroke. Remarkable in its formal construction, you can nevertheless feel his regrets, his fears, his very life coming to the fore through his protagonist, a retired professor played by Burt Lancaster. So solitary is his existence that he isn’t even given a name. He’s content in his Italian apartment, taking...
- 7/30/2017
- by Scott Nye
- CriterionCast
We return with a look at Luchino Visconti’s Rocco and His Brothers. Enjoy!
From Masters of Cinema:
From Luchino Visconti — the master director of such classics as La terra trema, Bellissima, and The Leopard — comes this epic study of family, sex, and betrayal. Alongside Fellini’s La dolce vita and Antonioni’s L’avventura, Visconti’s Rocco and His Brothers [Rocco e i suoi fratelli] ushered Italian cinema into a new era, one unafraid to confront head-on the hypocrisies of the ruling class, the squalor in urban living, and the collision between generations.
When a tight-knit family moves from Italy’s rural south to metropolitan Milan, the new possibilities – and threats – present in their fresh surroundings have alarming, unforeseen consequences. Operatically weaving the five brothers’ stories across a vast canvas, with an extraordinary cast including Alain Delon, Annie Girardot and Claudia Cardinale, Rocco and His Brothers stands as one of the most majestic and influential works of its era.
From Masters of Cinema:
From Luchino Visconti — the master director of such classics as La terra trema, Bellissima, and The Leopard — comes this epic study of family, sex, and betrayal. Alongside Fellini’s La dolce vita and Antonioni’s L’avventura, Visconti’s Rocco and His Brothers [Rocco e i suoi fratelli] ushered Italian cinema into a new era, one unafraid to confront head-on the hypocrisies of the ruling class, the squalor in urban living, and the collision between generations.
When a tight-knit family moves from Italy’s rural south to metropolitan Milan, the new possibilities – and threats – present in their fresh surroundings have alarming, unforeseen consequences. Operatically weaving the five brothers’ stories across a vast canvas, with an extraordinary cast including Alain Delon, Annie Girardot and Claudia Cardinale, Rocco and His Brothers stands as one of the most majestic and influential works of its era.
- 2/15/2017
- by Tom Jennings
- CriterionCast
Since any New York City cinephile has a nearly suffocating wealth of theatrical options, we figured it’d be best to compile some of the more worthwhile repertory showings into one handy list. Displayed below are a few of the city’s most reliable theaters and links to screenings of their weekend offerings — films you’re not likely to see in a theater again anytime soon, and many of which are, also, on 35mm. If you have a chance to attend any of these, we’re of the mind that it’s time extremely well-spent.
Metrograph
A Robert Aldrich retrospective has begun and is rich with pleasures.
The Howard Hughes-produced Cock of the Air and Visconti‘s Sandra screen on Sunday.
Chantal Akerman‘s masterpiece News from Home plays this Friday and Saturday. The Disney documentary Monkey Kingdom shows on the latter day and Sunday.
Museum of Modern Art...
Metrograph
A Robert Aldrich retrospective has begun and is rich with pleasures.
The Howard Hughes-produced Cock of the Air and Visconti‘s Sandra screen on Sunday.
Chantal Akerman‘s masterpiece News from Home plays this Friday and Saturday. The Disney documentary Monkey Kingdom shows on the latter day and Sunday.
Museum of Modern Art...
- 9/16/2016
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
For most of us in the United States, Helmut Berger is not someone who we are very familiar with. In Europe, however, most people know if his work, and his reputation for being unpredictable. Director Andreas Horvath submerges himself into Berger’s world in order to show us an intimate, uncensored look at the present life of a wounded man who once seemed to have it all in Helmut Berger, Actor.
Warning: Trailer is Nsfw, and shouldn’t be viewed by children.
A little backstory to get you in the proper head space: Berger had it made in the 70’s and 80’s. He was given his first film role by director Luchino Visconti in 1967, and things took off from there. He was leading a luxurious lifestyle with his, now lover, Visconti. Berger became a man about town, enjoying the finer things in life. When his partner died in 1976, Berger spiraled out of control.
Warning: Trailer is Nsfw, and shouldn’t be viewed by children.
A little backstory to get you in the proper head space: Berger had it made in the 70’s and 80’s. He was given his first film role by director Luchino Visconti in 1967, and things took off from there. He was leading a luxurious lifestyle with his, now lover, Visconti. Berger became a man about town, enjoying the finer things in life. When his partner died in 1976, Berger spiraled out of control.
- 6/6/2016
- by Melissa Howland
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
By Howard Hughes
New to DVD in the UK is ‘Arabella’, an Italian period comedy set in that hotbed of hilarity, pre-wwii fascist Italy. Virna Lisi stars in the title role – known variously in the film as Arabella Danesi and Arabella Angeli – who determines to save her grandmother from destitution by finding ingenious ways to pay off her elderly relative’s crippling tax bill.
The film is structured rather like those 1960s Italian portmanteau comedy-dramas, such as ‘Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow’, ‘The Witches’ or ‘Woman Times Seven’. Such films were intended as vehicles for one female star, be they Sophia, Silvana or Shirley, to demonstrate their versatility in a variety of roles. But instead of separate stories, with different characters, ‘Arabella’ has one continuous story arc, with Lisi’s sexy heroine adopting various costumes, personas and wigs to seduce and blackmail her way through a string of lovers, who are then...
New to DVD in the UK is ‘Arabella’, an Italian period comedy set in that hotbed of hilarity, pre-wwii fascist Italy. Virna Lisi stars in the title role – known variously in the film as Arabella Danesi and Arabella Angeli – who determines to save her grandmother from destitution by finding ingenious ways to pay off her elderly relative’s crippling tax bill.
The film is structured rather like those 1960s Italian portmanteau comedy-dramas, such as ‘Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow’, ‘The Witches’ or ‘Woman Times Seven’. Such films were intended as vehicles for one female star, be they Sophia, Silvana or Shirley, to demonstrate their versatility in a variety of roles. But instead of separate stories, with different characters, ‘Arabella’ has one continuous story arc, with Lisi’s sexy heroine adopting various costumes, personas and wigs to seduce and blackmail her way through a string of lovers, who are then...
- 4/4/2016
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
Massimo Dallamano may be best known to some as the cinematographer of Sergio Leone’s A Fistful of Dollars (1964) and For a Few Dollars More (1965), credited under the pseudonym Jack Dalmas. Following his collaborations with Leone, Dallamano would only serve as cinematographer twice more (his last credit being French director Michel Deville’s 1966 comedy The Mona Lisa Has Been Stolen starring George Chakiris and Marina Vlady). The explosive popularity of the spaghetti western would allow Dallamano to begin his own career as a director, with 1967 debut Bandidos (credited under another pseudonym, Max Dillman), but he’d soon after turn to the bread and butter of more exploitative genre fare. The director of eleven features, up until his death in 1976, Dallamano’s enduring, fascinating masterpiece stands as the 1972 title What Have You Done to Solange? Credited as a giallo staple, Dallamano’s film is more of a hybrid of subgenres, a mixed giallo and poliziotteschi film.
- 12/22/2015
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
'Million Dollar Baby' movie with Hilary Swank and Clint Eastwood. 'Million Dollar Baby' movie: Clint Eastwood contrived, overlong drama made (barely) watchable by first-rate central performance Fresh off the enthusiastically received – and insincere – Mystic River, Clint Eastwood went on to tackle the ups and downs of the boxing world in the 2004 melo Million Dollar Baby. Despite the cheery title, this is not the usual Rocky-esque rags-to-riches story of the determined underdog who inevitably becomes a super-topdog once she (in this case it's a “she”) puts on her gloves, jumps into the boxing ring, and starts using other women as punching bags. That's because about two-thirds into the film, Million Dollar Baby takes a radical turn toward tragedy that is as unexpected as everything else on screen is painfully predictable. In fact, once the dust is settled, even that last third quickly derails into the same sentimental mush Eastwood and...
- 10/7/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
After being a major influence on his work, Martin Scorsese worked with Milestone Films to bring forth a stellar-looking restoration of Luchino Visconti’s 1960 classic drama Rocco and His Brothers. After stopping by various festivals, including Tiff and Nyff, it’ll be released in NYC and Los Angeles next month, followed by hopefully a home release.
We now have a new trailer, which is fairly brief, but gives us a glimpse at the restoration while introducing our main ensemble. Starring Alain Delon, Annie Girardot, and Claudia Cardinale, check out the trailer and gorgeous poster (designed by Lauren Caddick) below for the film which kicks off its three-week run at Film Forum on Friday, October 9.
Joining the tragic exodus of millions from Italy’s impoverished south, the formidable matriarch of the Parondi clan (Katina Paxinou, Best Supporting Oscar winner, For Whom the Bell Tolls) and her brood emerge from Milan’s...
We now have a new trailer, which is fairly brief, but gives us a glimpse at the restoration while introducing our main ensemble. Starring Alain Delon, Annie Girardot, and Claudia Cardinale, check out the trailer and gorgeous poster (designed by Lauren Caddick) below for the film which kicks off its three-week run at Film Forum on Friday, October 9.
Joining the tragic exodus of millions from Italy’s impoverished south, the formidable matriarch of the Parondi clan (Katina Paxinou, Best Supporting Oscar winner, For Whom the Bell Tolls) and her brood emerge from Milan’s...
- 9/17/2015
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
This time on the podcast, Scott is joined by David Blakeslee and Trevor Berrett to discuss Luchino Visconti’s Senso.
About the film:
This lush, Technicolor tragic romance from Luchino Visconti stars Alida Valli as a nineteenth-century Italian countess who, during the Austrian occupation of her country, puts her marriage and political principles on the line by engaging in a torrid affair with a dashing Austrian lieutenant, played by Farley Granger. Gilded with ornate costumes and sets and a rich classical soundtrack, and featuring fearless performances, this operatic melodrama is an extraordinary evocation of reckless emotions and deranged lust, from one of the cinema’s great sensualists.
Subscribe to the podcast via RSS or in iTunes
Buy The Film On Amazon:
Watch Criterion’s Three Reasons Video:
Episode Links:
Senso (1954) – The Criterion Collection Senso and Sensibility – The Criterion Collection Senso (1954) – IMDb Senso – Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia Roger Ebert’s Great...
About the film:
This lush, Technicolor tragic romance from Luchino Visconti stars Alida Valli as a nineteenth-century Italian countess who, during the Austrian occupation of her country, puts her marriage and political principles on the line by engaging in a torrid affair with a dashing Austrian lieutenant, played by Farley Granger. Gilded with ornate costumes and sets and a rich classical soundtrack, and featuring fearless performances, this operatic melodrama is an extraordinary evocation of reckless emotions and deranged lust, from one of the cinema’s great sensualists.
Subscribe to the podcast via RSS or in iTunes
Buy The Film On Amazon:
Watch Criterion’s Three Reasons Video:
Episode Links:
Senso (1954) – The Criterion Collection Senso and Sensibility – The Criterion Collection Senso (1954) – IMDb Senso – Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia Roger Ebert’s Great...
- 7/14/2015
- by Scott Nye
- CriterionCast
Now I Lay Me Down to Kill: Munzi’s Enjoyably Reserved Mafia Film
Premiering last fall at the 2014 Venice Film Festival, where it picked up a handful of prizes, Francesco Munzi’s third film, Black Souls, is a deliberately paced examination of familiar mafia standards. Based on a novel by Giacchino Criaco, it’s bound to be compared (and perhaps exist within the shadow of) Matteo Garrone’s highly celebrated 2008 feature, Gomorrah. But Munzi’s film is equally convincing, lending an austere sense of realism to what otherwise plays like a classic theatrical tragedy of three brothers at odds, locked in opposition and contention with the heavy baggage of their lineage. Light on dialogue and heavy on brooding characters marinating in their own mistrust or disdain of one another, it’s a successfully engaging film, but despite an enjoyably dire finale, isn’t as memorable as some modern comparative material.
Premiering last fall at the 2014 Venice Film Festival, where it picked up a handful of prizes, Francesco Munzi’s third film, Black Souls, is a deliberately paced examination of familiar mafia standards. Based on a novel by Giacchino Criaco, it’s bound to be compared (and perhaps exist within the shadow of) Matteo Garrone’s highly celebrated 2008 feature, Gomorrah. But Munzi’s film is equally convincing, lending an austere sense of realism to what otherwise plays like a classic theatrical tragedy of three brothers at odds, locked in opposition and contention with the heavy baggage of their lineage. Light on dialogue and heavy on brooding characters marinating in their own mistrust or disdain of one another, it’s a successfully engaging film, but despite an enjoyably dire finale, isn’t as memorable as some modern comparative material.
- 4/9/2015
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Anna Magnani in a publicity photo for The Passionate Thief.One thing cinephiles learn fast is just how easy it is, thanks to the limits and whims of distribution, for celebrated films to fade into the background outside their homeland. So one way to begin with Italian director Mario Monicelli is how overshadowed he is today on the world stage. You could say, only half-ironically, that he'd be more famous if only more people had heard of him, or if his global reputation kept up with the one he holds in Italy. Monicelli began filmmaking in the 1930s, was a prolific screenwriter in the 40s, took off as a director in the 50s, and continued making movies without much pause until his death in 2010. In his heyday as a hitmaker, he worked with stars like Anna Magnani, Marcello Mastroianni, Totò, Claudia Cardinale, and Monica Vitti. He once shared a Golden...
- 4/6/2015
- by Duncan Gray
- MUBI
The past year has been a great one as concerns the availability and restoration of several titles from Italian auteur Liliana Cavani, a director who came to fame and notoriety alongside peers such as Pasolini, Bellocchio, and Bertolucci. Her work has often faced difficulty in achieving the same sort of international acclaim as those male colleagues, each of them certified as a particular brand within the cinematic canon. And yet, Cavani is as equally provocative and prolific, with boundary pushing titles languishing in obscurity, usually historical reconstructions with gender or sexuality as a unique entry. Her work has often been described as having a feminist bent, but Cavani isn’t aspiring to create female agency in spaces dominated by masculinity. Rather, her concern resides in honest depictions of women ravaged by male dominated systems. Cavani’s most notorious title, 1974’s The Night Porter, received a Blu-ray transfer from Criterion recently,...
- 1/13/2015
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
A Bigger Splash
Director: Luca Guadagnino // Writer: David Kajganich
It’s hard to believe that it’s been six years since Luca Guadagnino’s art house favorite I Am Love (2009) swept through Venice and Toronto, starring a delectable Tilda Swinton in an homage to Visconti. That was Guadagnino’s third and most acclaimed film (previously he’s directed Melissa P. in 2005 and 1999’s The Protagonists, also starring Swinton). After several experimental projects and documentaries, he’s signed onto several projects that never took off, including most notably an adaptation of Don DeLillo’s The Body Artist with Isabelle Huppert, Sigourney Weaver, David Cronenberg, and Denis Lavant all lined up to star (the project is now under the direction of Benoit Jacquot and will film with mostly unknowns sometime in 2015). Out of the blue, he announced he would be making A Bigger Splash, a remake of the 1969 Jacques Deray film La Piscine,...
Director: Luca Guadagnino // Writer: David Kajganich
It’s hard to believe that it’s been six years since Luca Guadagnino’s art house favorite I Am Love (2009) swept through Venice and Toronto, starring a delectable Tilda Swinton in an homage to Visconti. That was Guadagnino’s third and most acclaimed film (previously he’s directed Melissa P. in 2005 and 1999’s The Protagonists, also starring Swinton). After several experimental projects and documentaries, he’s signed onto several projects that never took off, including most notably an adaptation of Don DeLillo’s The Body Artist with Isabelle Huppert, Sigourney Weaver, David Cronenberg, and Denis Lavant all lined up to star (the project is now under the direction of Benoit Jacquot and will film with mostly unknowns sometime in 2015). Out of the blue, he announced he would be making A Bigger Splash, a remake of the 1969 Jacques Deray film La Piscine,...
- 1/9/2015
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Opening Night – World Premiere
Gone Girl
David Fincher, USA, 2014, Dcp, 150m
David Fincher’s film version of Gillian Flynn’s phenomenally successful best seller (adapted by the author) is one wild cinematic ride, a perfectly cast and intensely compressed portrait of a recession-era marriage contained within a devastating depiction of celebrity/media culture, shifting gears as smoothly as a Maserati 250F. Ben Affleck is Nick Dunne, whose wife Amy (Rosamund Pike) goes missing on the day of their fifth anniversary. Neil Patrick Harris is Amy’s old boyfriend Desi, Carrie Coon (who played Honey in Tracy Letts’s acclaimed production of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?) is Nick’s sister Margo, Kim Dickens (Treme, Friday Night Lights) is Detective Rhonda Boney, and Tyler Perry is Nick’s superstar lawyer Tanner Bolt. At once a grand panoramic vision of middle America, a uniquely disturbing exploration of the fault lines in a marriage,...
Gone Girl
David Fincher, USA, 2014, Dcp, 150m
David Fincher’s film version of Gillian Flynn’s phenomenally successful best seller (adapted by the author) is one wild cinematic ride, a perfectly cast and intensely compressed portrait of a recession-era marriage contained within a devastating depiction of celebrity/media culture, shifting gears as smoothly as a Maserati 250F. Ben Affleck is Nick Dunne, whose wife Amy (Rosamund Pike) goes missing on the day of their fifth anniversary. Neil Patrick Harris is Amy’s old boyfriend Desi, Carrie Coon (who played Honey in Tracy Letts’s acclaimed production of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?) is Nick’s sister Margo, Kim Dickens (Treme, Friday Night Lights) is Detective Rhonda Boney, and Tyler Perry is Nick’s superstar lawyer Tanner Bolt. At once a grand panoramic vision of middle America, a uniquely disturbing exploration of the fault lines in a marriage,...
- 8/20/2014
- by Notebook
- MUBI
The Leopard
Directed by Luchino Visconti
Italy, 1963
Upon sitting down to write a review of Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard, I thought about the monumental task in front of me: ‘How do I do justice to one of the greatest films ever made?’ It’s easy: I can’t. I mean, I’ll do my best, but no amount of complimentary adjectives or animated textual analysis can re-create the affecting experience of watching Visconti’s epic masterpiece.
Adapted from Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s posthumously published Il Gattopardo, The Leopard takes place in a specific historical moment—Italy’s Risorgimento period—but it could really be set anywhere at any time. It’s about the painful inevitability of adapting to change and the erosion of one norm for another. Don Fabrizio Corbera (Burt Lancaster) is the Prince of Salina, and with middle-age upon him and revolution around him, he understands...
Directed by Luchino Visconti
Italy, 1963
Upon sitting down to write a review of Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard, I thought about the monumental task in front of me: ‘How do I do justice to one of the greatest films ever made?’ It’s easy: I can’t. I mean, I’ll do my best, but no amount of complimentary adjectives or animated textual analysis can re-create the affecting experience of watching Visconti’s epic masterpiece.
Adapted from Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s posthumously published Il Gattopardo, The Leopard takes place in a specific historical moment—Italy’s Risorgimento period—but it could really be set anywhere at any time. It’s about the painful inevitability of adapting to change and the erosion of one norm for another. Don Fabrizio Corbera (Burt Lancaster) is the Prince of Salina, and with middle-age upon him and revolution around him, he understands...
- 5/20/2014
- by Griffin Bell
- SoundOnSight
(Francesco Rosi, 1963; Eureka!, PG)
In the 1960s, serious Italian cinema led by Fellini, Antonioni and Visconti moved decisively from neorealism into a new phase of more formal and personal movies with a wider social focus. Alongside them was Francesco Rosi, a former lawyer and one-time assistant to Visconti and Antonioni, who made an immediate impression with his film Salvatore Giuliano. A sort of Marxist Citizen Kane, it used the career of the eponymous bandit to anatomise Sicilian society and the role of the Mafia. It was the beginning of a series of political dramas about crime, corruption and exploitation in Italy that occupied Rosi for the next decade. The next one, Le mani sulla città (Hands over the City), took him back to his native Naples and a collaboration with an old friend, Raffaele La Capria.
Most films in this series (Salvatore Giuliano, The Mattei Affair, Lucky Luciano, Christ Stopped...
In the 1960s, serious Italian cinema led by Fellini, Antonioni and Visconti moved decisively from neorealism into a new phase of more formal and personal movies with a wider social focus. Alongside them was Francesco Rosi, a former lawyer and one-time assistant to Visconti and Antonioni, who made an immediate impression with his film Salvatore Giuliano. A sort of Marxist Citizen Kane, it used the career of the eponymous bandit to anatomise Sicilian society and the role of the Mafia. It was the beginning of a series of political dramas about crime, corruption and exploitation in Italy that occupied Rosi for the next decade. The next one, Le mani sulla città (Hands over the City), took him back to his native Naples and a collaboration with an old friend, Raffaele La Capria.
Most films in this series (Salvatore Giuliano, The Mattei Affair, Lucky Luciano, Christ Stopped...
- 4/12/2014
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
A Criterion Royal Flush! concludes at Trailers from Hell, with screenwriter Larry Karaszewski introducing Luchino Visconti's Italian cinema classic "The Leopard," starring Burt Lancaster.Classical movie making of the highest order, Visconti’s sweeping 1963 epic set during the Italian revolution plants Lancaster (forced on the director by nervous producers, but ultimately a valued working partner) at the center of a long form feast for the senses, photographed by the great Giuseppe Rotunno (Amarcord, Satyricon) and with music by Nino Rota (La Dolce Vita, The Godfather). Surely a major influence on Bernardo Bertolucci’s grandiose epic 1900, also featuring Lancaster. Various versions exist, ranging from 205 minutes to 151. One of Martin Scorsese’s favorites.
- 2/28/2014
- by Trailers From Hell
- Thompson on Hollywood
Marina Roberti is the costume designer of the Italian box office hit Sole a Catinelle. She has worked in the Us with the likes of Milena Canonero, Sandy Powell and Dante Ferretti…
How did you become a costume designer?
When I was a kid I was a bumbler at school. I spent all the time drawing and reading. My parents were kind of worried so they decided to enroll me at a fashion college in Turin, my home town. During my last school year they took us to Rome to visit the National Film School. Next year I decided to try and join the school. I thought I could never make it but I did and so I started attending the costume course.
Piero Tosi (costume designer of Il Gattopardo) was one of your teachers in Rome. What did you learn from him?
The most important thing he taught me...
How did you become a costume designer?
When I was a kid I was a bumbler at school. I spent all the time drawing and reading. My parents were kind of worried so they decided to enroll me at a fashion college in Turin, my home town. During my last school year they took us to Rome to visit the National Film School. Next year I decided to try and join the school. I thought I could never make it but I did and so I started attending the costume course.
Piero Tosi (costume designer of Il Gattopardo) was one of your teachers in Rome. What did you learn from him?
The most important thing he taught me...
- 2/28/2014
- by Lord Christopher Laverty
- Clothes on Film
Scorsese doc in Berlin, Tokyo sets dates, Pan-Asia Film Festival stretches across UK, Locarno to honour Titanus studio, and Ilkley plans first edition.Scorsese & Tedeschi doc added to Berlin
Untitled New York Review Of Books Documentary directed by Martin Scorsese and David Tedeschi is the newest addition to the Berlinale Special, where it will be shown as a work in progress, followed by a discussion with the filmmakers and key contributors. More here.
Tokyo sets 2014 dates
The 27th Tokyo International Film Festival (Tiff) will be held from October 23-31. Tiffcom will run earlier than last year, from Oct 21-23.
The festival revealed that its 2013 edition drew 121,771 people, up 14%. Tiffcom 2013 hosted 316 exhibitors, up 15%, and 1,074 buyers, up 9%. More info here.
Locarno to celebrate Titanus
The 67th edition of the Locarno Film Festival (Aug 6-16) is planning a retrospective on the Italian production studio Titanus.
The production company was founded by Gustavo Lombardo in 1904, and Locarno will celebrate the company...
Untitled New York Review Of Books Documentary directed by Martin Scorsese and David Tedeschi is the newest addition to the Berlinale Special, where it will be shown as a work in progress, followed by a discussion with the filmmakers and key contributors. More here.
Tokyo sets 2014 dates
The 27th Tokyo International Film Festival (Tiff) will be held from October 23-31. Tiffcom will run earlier than last year, from Oct 21-23.
The festival revealed that its 2013 edition drew 121,771 people, up 14%. Tiffcom 2013 hosted 316 exhibitors, up 15%, and 1,074 buyers, up 9%. More info here.
Locarno to celebrate Titanus
The 67th edition of the Locarno Film Festival (Aug 6-16) is planning a retrospective on the Italian production studio Titanus.
The production company was founded by Gustavo Lombardo in 1904, and Locarno will celebrate the company...
- 1/28/2014
- by wendy.mitchell@screendaily.com (Wendy Mitchell)
- ScreenDaily
Scorsese doc in Berlin, Tokyo sets dates, Pan-Asia Film Festival stretches across UK, Locarno to honour Titanus studio, and Ilkley plans first edition.Scorsese & Tedeschi doc added to Berlin
Untitled New York Review Of Books Documentary directed by Martin Scorsese and David Tedeschi is the newest addition to the Berlinale Special, where it will be shown as a work in progress, followed by a discussion with the filmmakers and key contributors. More here.
Tokyo sets 2014 dates
The 27th Tokyo International Film Festival (Tiff) will be held from October 23-31. Tiffcom will run earlier than last year, from Oct 21-23.
The festival revealed that its 2013 edition drew 121,771 people, up 14%. Tiffcom 2013 hosted 316 exhibitors, up 15%, and 1,074 buyers, up 9%. More info here.
Locarno to celebrate Titanus
The 67th edition of the Locarno Film Festival (Aug 6-16) is planning a retrospective on the Italian production studio Titanus.
The production company was founded by Gustavo Lombardo in 1904, and Locarno will celebrate the company...
Untitled New York Review Of Books Documentary directed by Martin Scorsese and David Tedeschi is the newest addition to the Berlinale Special, where it will be shown as a work in progress, followed by a discussion with the filmmakers and key contributors. More here.
Tokyo sets 2014 dates
The 27th Tokyo International Film Festival (Tiff) will be held from October 23-31. Tiffcom will run earlier than last year, from Oct 21-23.
The festival revealed that its 2013 edition drew 121,771 people, up 14%. Tiffcom 2013 hosted 316 exhibitors, up 15%, and 1,074 buyers, up 9%. More info here.
Locarno to celebrate Titanus
The 67th edition of the Locarno Film Festival (Aug 6-16) is planning a retrospective on the Italian production studio Titanus.
The production company was founded by Gustavo Lombardo in 1904, and Locarno will celebrate the company...
- 1/28/2014
- by wendy.mitchell@screendaily.com (Wendy Mitchell)
- ScreenDaily
Tokyo sets dates, Pan-Asia Film Festival stretches across UK, Locarno to honour Titanus studio, and Ilkley plans first edition.Tokyo sets 2014 dates
The 27th Tokyo International Film Festival (Tiff) will be held from October 23-31. Tiffcom will run earlier than last year, from Oct 21-23.
The festival revealed that its 2013 edition drew 121,771 people, up 14%. Tiffcom 2013 hosted 316 exhibitors, up 15%, and 1,074 buyers, up 9%. More info here.
Locarno to celebrate Titanus
The 67th edition of the Locarno Film Festival (Aug 6-16) is planning a retrospective on the Italian production studio Titanus.
The production company was founded by Gustavo Lombardo in 1904, and Locarno will celebrate the company’s history as well as its present day output.
The Festival audience will have the opportunity to see melodramas starring the screen couple Nazzari-Sanson, directed by Matarazzo, the Pane amore and Poveri ma belli series directed by Comencini and Risi.
It will also screen films that revealed auteurs such as Fellini, Visconti, Lattuada...
The 27th Tokyo International Film Festival (Tiff) will be held from October 23-31. Tiffcom will run earlier than last year, from Oct 21-23.
The festival revealed that its 2013 edition drew 121,771 people, up 14%. Tiffcom 2013 hosted 316 exhibitors, up 15%, and 1,074 buyers, up 9%. More info here.
Locarno to celebrate Titanus
The 67th edition of the Locarno Film Festival (Aug 6-16) is planning a retrospective on the Italian production studio Titanus.
The production company was founded by Gustavo Lombardo in 1904, and Locarno will celebrate the company’s history as well as its present day output.
The Festival audience will have the opportunity to see melodramas starring the screen couple Nazzari-Sanson, directed by Matarazzo, the Pane amore and Poveri ma belli series directed by Comencini and Risi.
It will also screen films that revealed auteurs such as Fellini, Visconti, Lattuada...
- 1/28/2014
- by wendy.mitchell@screendaily.com (Wendy Mitchell)
- ScreenDaily
This year, the Marrakech Film Festival, with the highest-profile jury it has ever boasted and a Scandinavian tribute that brought some of the most exciting international filmmakers to town too, was heaving with ingenues and rising stars. But one of the pleasures of this festival has always been the opportunity it affords to get to meet with some of the more established, classic actors of our time—last year we enjoyed a riotous interview with Terence Stamp, for example—and this year was no exception as we got to sit down with Charlotte Rampling, whose fascinating and unique presence has been gracing our screens since the mid-sixties. In fact, in the early part of her career, Rampling's almost unearthly beauty, and the wildly unconventional life she lived offscreen (drug use, menages a trois, personal tragedies) kind of defined an era, while her daring and transgressive arthouse roles (in Visconti's...
- 12/13/2013
- by Jessica Kiang
- The Playlist
It's 100 years since the first volume of À La Recherche du Temps Perdu was published, but a definitive cinematisation of Proust's epic novel has so far proved elusive
This year has been punctuated by a rash of anniversary-themed books and articles anticipating the first world war centenary, and indeed attempting snapshots of how Europe looked and felt in 1913, eerily poised on the precipice. The other centenary is similar in many ways: on 8 November 1913, Marcel Proust published the first volume of À La Recherche du Temps Perdu, his monumental novel about memory, mortality and art, the belle époque, and the leisured and aristocratic classes of Paris, a city crammed in Proust's pages with the most vivid and extraordinary personalities, destined to be swept away by the Great War.
Fourteen years ago, at Cannes, I saw Raúl Ruiz's superlative screen adaptation of the final volume: Time Regained, in which the narrator,...
This year has been punctuated by a rash of anniversary-themed books and articles anticipating the first world war centenary, and indeed attempting snapshots of how Europe looked and felt in 1913, eerily poised on the precipice. The other centenary is similar in many ways: on 8 November 1913, Marcel Proust published the first volume of À La Recherche du Temps Perdu, his monumental novel about memory, mortality and art, the belle époque, and the leisured and aristocratic classes of Paris, a city crammed in Proust's pages with the most vivid and extraordinary personalities, destined to be swept away by the Great War.
Fourteen years ago, at Cannes, I saw Raúl Ruiz's superlative screen adaptation of the final volume: Time Regained, in which the narrator,...
- 11/7/2013
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Italy leads the world of cinema in mourning a man whose films were a blend of reality, wit, fantasy and brazen self-indulgence
The renowned film director Federico Fellini died at midday yesterday, ending a 90-day struggle for health and later for life, and closing an era in both 20th century Italian culture and world cinema.
On the day after his 50th wedding anniversary, Fellini's heart finally gave way under the stress of a haemorrhage which had crippled his left side.
He died, aged 73, in the Umberto I Polyclinic hospital in Rome, although he first fell ill in his home town of Rimini on August 3. Fellini insisted on leaving the Rome hospital as late as October 17 for the evening to take his wife, Giulietta Masina, to dinner. He went into the coma soon afterwards.'Fifty years ago,' said Ms Masina, 'I realised that this was a man for me.
The renowned film director Federico Fellini died at midday yesterday, ending a 90-day struggle for health and later for life, and closing an era in both 20th century Italian culture and world cinema.
On the day after his 50th wedding anniversary, Fellini's heart finally gave way under the stress of a haemorrhage which had crippled his left side.
He died, aged 73, in the Umberto I Polyclinic hospital in Rome, although he first fell ill in his home town of Rimini on August 3. Fellini insisted on leaving the Rome hospital as late as October 17 for the evening to take his wife, Giulietta Masina, to dinner. He went into the coma soon afterwards.'Fifty years ago,' said Ms Masina, 'I realised that this was a man for me.
- 11/1/2013
- by Ed Vulliamy
- The Guardian - Film News
Sixties screen siren Claudia Cardinale talks to Steve Rose about entrancing Fellini, spurning Brando – and why appearing in 135 films still isn't enough
There's nothing Claudia Cardinale hates more than staying still, but for the past two months she's had to do exactly that. She broke her foot on holiday in Tunisia and has since been holed up in her Paris flat. "It was stupid," she says, in her distinctive Mediterranean rasp. "I was playing volleyball. There was water on the edge of swimming pool, and I slipped. I like to be active, so when I have to sit for two months without going out, it's terrible. I had many places to go and I had to refuse: Venice, Kiev, Osaka. Now it's Ok. Yesterday I went out for the first time, but the weather is ugly."
Cardinale is a survivor from the era when movie giants walked the earth – most of them alongside her.
There's nothing Claudia Cardinale hates more than staying still, but for the past two months she's had to do exactly that. She broke her foot on holiday in Tunisia and has since been holed up in her Paris flat. "It was stupid," she says, in her distinctive Mediterranean rasp. "I was playing volleyball. There was water on the edge of swimming pool, and I slipped. I like to be active, so when I have to sit for two months without going out, it's terrible. I had many places to go and I had to refuse: Venice, Kiev, Osaka. Now it's Ok. Yesterday I went out for the first time, but the weather is ugly."
Cardinale is a survivor from the era when movie giants walked the earth – most of them alongside her.
- 9/12/2013
- by Steve Rose
- The Guardian - Film News
In his final column for the Observer, our film critic welcomes the re-release of two influential classics from the late 1950s
What goes around comes around. Or "This is where we came in!", the words we'd whisper back in the days of continuous movie performances, before heading for the exit when we reached the point at which we'd entered the cinema. Appropriately in the week I write my final film column, two classic movies, Bonjour Tristesse (1958) and Plein Soleil (aka Purple Noon, 1959), are re-released from that period at the end of the 1950s when I was embarking on a career as a professional writer. Both appear in beautiful new prints that do full justice to the Mediterranean sun which dictates their mood of dangerous eroticism, and both are closely associated with what was popularly known as the French Nouvelle Vague. In the first of them an English-speaking cast play French...
What goes around comes around. Or "This is where we came in!", the words we'd whisper back in the days of continuous movie performances, before heading for the exit when we reached the point at which we'd entered the cinema. Appropriately in the week I write my final film column, two classic movies, Bonjour Tristesse (1958) and Plein Soleil (aka Purple Noon, 1959), are re-released from that period at the end of the 1950s when I was embarking on a career as a professional writer. Both appear in beautiful new prints that do full justice to the Mediterranean sun which dictates their mood of dangerous eroticism, and both are closely associated with what was popularly known as the French Nouvelle Vague. In the first of them an English-speaking cast play French...
- 8/31/2013
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
(Federico Fellini, 1980; Eureka!, 15)
Federico Fellini began his movie career writing gags in 1940, and became a key figure as scriptwriter and director in the postwar neorealist movement. He transformed Italian cinema with the expensive, satirical La Dolce Vita in 1960, in which Italy's greatest star, Marcello Mastroianni, played Fellini's alter ego. The term "Felliniesque" was coined to describe this extravagant, fantastical style, at its most extreme in City of Women (aka La Città delle Donne), an extended nightmare that kicks off with references to Dante and Lewis Carroll. The middle-aged womaniser Snaporaz (Mastroianni), asleep on a train, emerges from a tunnel to be led by a beguiling white rabbit (or doe) into a Dante-esque dark wood and a succession of erotic and frightening encounters with a variety of women ranging from old crones to hot-rodding punks. Masochistic, misogynistic, City of Women is a flamboyant, sophisticated series of set pieces, a boastful apologia pro vita sua.
Federico Fellini began his movie career writing gags in 1940, and became a key figure as scriptwriter and director in the postwar neorealist movement. He transformed Italian cinema with the expensive, satirical La Dolce Vita in 1960, in which Italy's greatest star, Marcello Mastroianni, played Fellini's alter ego. The term "Felliniesque" was coined to describe this extravagant, fantastical style, at its most extreme in City of Women (aka La Città delle Donne), an extended nightmare that kicks off with references to Dante and Lewis Carroll. The middle-aged womaniser Snaporaz (Mastroianni), asleep on a train, emerges from a tunnel to be led by a beguiling white rabbit (or doe) into a Dante-esque dark wood and a succession of erotic and frightening encounters with a variety of women ranging from old crones to hot-rodding punks. Masochistic, misogynistic, City of Women is a flamboyant, sophisticated series of set pieces, a boastful apologia pro vita sua.
- 3/17/2013
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
If starring in your son's debut film wasn't nerve-wracking enough, Charlotte Rampling managed to break her wrist just before production started on psychological thriller 'I, Anna'.
"I didn't dare tell him," laughs Rampling, a lot more jovial and smiley in the flesh than her smouldering, enigmatic persona might suggest. "I'm not someone who falls over, it was one of those freak things, so I just turned up and tried to soldier on. In the end, we ended up writing it into the story, showing this poor woman to be in even more pain than we'd thought. It was meant to be."
Charlotte Rampling plays Anna - abandoned, overlooked, grieving and on a disastrous path
The 'poor woman' is the eponymous Anna, an overlooked woman of a certain age, whose foray into singles-night dating takes her on a disastrous path, but also into the sights of detective Bernie Reid, played by Gabriel Byrne.
"I didn't dare tell him," laughs Rampling, a lot more jovial and smiley in the flesh than her smouldering, enigmatic persona might suggest. "I'm not someone who falls over, it was one of those freak things, so I just turned up and tried to soldier on. In the end, we ended up writing it into the story, showing this poor woman to be in even more pain than we'd thought. It was meant to be."
Charlotte Rampling plays Anna - abandoned, overlooked, grieving and on a disastrous path
The 'poor woman' is the eponymous Anna, an overlooked woman of a certain age, whose foray into singles-night dating takes her on a disastrous path, but also into the sights of detective Bernie Reid, played by Gabriel Byrne.
- 12/4/2012
- by Caroline Frost
- Huffington Post
DVD Release Date: Dec. 11, 2012
Price: DVD $49.98
Studio: Entertainment One
Helmut Berger and Romy Schneider star in Visconti's 1972 epic Ludwig.
Luchino Visconti: Four Films is a five-disc collection that spotlights a quartet of the great Italian filmmaker’s works that span nearly three decades.
Through an impressive and highly acclaimed canon, Luchino Visconti (Senso, Conversation Piece) contributed significantly to the post-World War II revolution in Italian filmmaking, earned him the title of “Father of Neorealism” in the process.
The collection’s four films include the following:
La Terra Trema (1948): This a haunting film uses the early neorealism format developed by Roberto Rossellini and Vittorio De Sica to trace the doom and disintegration of one Sicilian fishing family. Winner of the International Award for Best Film at the Venice Film Festival, the movie was a New York Times Critic’s Pick when it ran theatrically in 1965,
Bellissima (1951): Anna Magnani...
Price: DVD $49.98
Studio: Entertainment One
Helmut Berger and Romy Schneider star in Visconti's 1972 epic Ludwig.
Luchino Visconti: Four Films is a five-disc collection that spotlights a quartet of the great Italian filmmaker’s works that span nearly three decades.
Through an impressive and highly acclaimed canon, Luchino Visconti (Senso, Conversation Piece) contributed significantly to the post-World War II revolution in Italian filmmaking, earned him the title of “Father of Neorealism” in the process.
The collection’s four films include the following:
La Terra Trema (1948): This a haunting film uses the early neorealism format developed by Roberto Rossellini and Vittorio De Sica to trace the doom and disintegration of one Sicilian fishing family. Winner of the International Award for Best Film at the Venice Film Festival, the movie was a New York Times Critic’s Pick when it ran theatrically in 1965,
Bellissima (1951): Anna Magnani...
- 11/30/2012
- by Laurence
- Disc Dish
We asked you to send in your questions for the doyenne of British film. This lunchtime, she responds …
It was Barry Norman who first coined the verb "to rample" (def: "an ability to reduce a man to helplessness though a chilly sensuality"). Now, here's your chance to have your own words virtually rampled: Charlotte Rampling is in town this week to promote I, Anna, a new noir thriller told from the point of view of Rampling's femme fatale, who falls for the detective (Gabriel Byrne) in charge of a murder case. The film – the directorial debut of Rampling's son, Barnaby Southcombe – boasts a sterling cast including Eddie Marsan, Honor Blackman and Hayley Atwell. The film opens in the UK on 7 December and you can watch a trailer for it here.
Perhaps you'd like to quiz Rampling on her immaculate back catalogue, from her two early movies with Dirk Bogarde (Visconti's The Damned,...
It was Barry Norman who first coined the verb "to rample" (def: "an ability to reduce a man to helplessness though a chilly sensuality"). Now, here's your chance to have your own words virtually rampled: Charlotte Rampling is in town this week to promote I, Anna, a new noir thriller told from the point of view of Rampling's femme fatale, who falls for the detective (Gabriel Byrne) in charge of a murder case. The film – the directorial debut of Rampling's son, Barnaby Southcombe – boasts a sterling cast including Eddie Marsan, Honor Blackman and Hayley Atwell. The film opens in the UK on 7 December and you can watch a trailer for it here.
Perhaps you'd like to quiz Rampling on her immaculate back catalogue, from her two early movies with Dirk Bogarde (Visconti's The Damned,...
- 11/27/2012
- The Guardian - Film News
While the future of home entertainment may be rapidly moving towards a digital streaming-led future, we can't be the only movie nerds who still love owning a physical copy of something. Sure, BluRay and DVD might be scratchable, easily lost and adorned by terrible box art, but there's something about the feeling of finding an undiscovered gem in the depths of a store, or getting a rarity in the post, that doesn't quite compare to clicking and watching something on Netflix.
As such, starting with this column, every month we're going to pick out five BluRays or DVDs new to the market that no self-respecting cinephile's shelves could do without. Some are shiny new versions of stone-cold classics, some are obscurities, some might even be brand new releases (although less often: those are covered pretty well elsewhere). Read on for more.
"Chinatown" (1974)
Why You Should Care: Simply put, it's one...
As such, starting with this column, every month we're going to pick out five BluRays or DVDs new to the market that no self-respecting cinephile's shelves could do without. Some are shiny new versions of stone-cold classics, some are obscurities, some might even be brand new releases (although less often: those are covered pretty well elsewhere). Read on for more.
"Chinatown" (1974)
Why You Should Care: Simply put, it's one...
- 4/4/2012
- by Drew Taylor
- The Playlist
Blu-ray Release Date: April 10, 2011
Price: Blu-ray $29.98
Studio: Raro Video
Burt Lancaster stars in Luchino Visconti's 1974 drama Conversation Piece.
Italian DVD label Raro Video releases the 1974 drama Conversation Piece, Luchino Visconti’s (Senso) penultimate film, one month after issuing the film on DVD in early March, 2012.
Entitled Gruppo di famiglia in un interno in its native Italian, the movie examines the solitary life of a retired American professor (Burt Lancaster, Sweet Smell of Success) who lives alone in a luxurious palazzo in Rome. When he is confronted by a vulgar Italian marchesa Silvana Mangano, Dune) and her companions – her lover (Helmut Berger, The Romantic Englishwoman), her daughter (Claudia Marsani, The Hired Gun), and jer daughter’s boyfriend (Stefano Patrizi, Lion of the Desert) – he is forced to rent them an apartment on the upper floor of his home. Before long, the introverted professor’s routine is turned upside down and...
Price: Blu-ray $29.98
Studio: Raro Video
Burt Lancaster stars in Luchino Visconti's 1974 drama Conversation Piece.
Italian DVD label Raro Video releases the 1974 drama Conversation Piece, Luchino Visconti’s (Senso) penultimate film, one month after issuing the film on DVD in early March, 2012.
Entitled Gruppo di famiglia in un interno in its native Italian, the movie examines the solitary life of a retired American professor (Burt Lancaster, Sweet Smell of Success) who lives alone in a luxurious palazzo in Rome. When he is confronted by a vulgar Italian marchesa Silvana Mangano, Dune) and her companions – her lover (Helmut Berger, The Romantic Englishwoman), her daughter (Claudia Marsani, The Hired Gun), and jer daughter’s boyfriend (Stefano Patrizi, Lion of the Desert) – he is forced to rent them an apartment on the upper floor of his home. Before long, the introverted professor’s routine is turned upside down and...
- 3/23/2012
- by Laurence
- Disc Dish
DVD Playhouse—March 2012
By Allen Gardner
J. Edgar (Warner Bros.) Director Clint Eastwood provides a rock-solid, albeit rather flat portrait of polarizing FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, covering his life from late teens to his death. Leonardo DiCaprio does an impressive turn as Hoover, never crossing the line into caricature, and creating a Hoover that is all too human, making for an all the more unsettling look at absolute power run amuck. Where the film stumbles is the love story at its core: Hoover’s relationship with longtime aide Clyde Tolson (Armie Hammer). In the hands of an openly-gay director like Gus Van Sant, this could have been a heartbreaking, tender story of forbidden (unrequited?) love, but Eastwood seems to tiptoe around their romance, with far too much delicacy and deference. The film works well when recreating the famous crimes and investigations which Hoover made his name on (the Lindbergh kidnapping,...
By Allen Gardner
J. Edgar (Warner Bros.) Director Clint Eastwood provides a rock-solid, albeit rather flat portrait of polarizing FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, covering his life from late teens to his death. Leonardo DiCaprio does an impressive turn as Hoover, never crossing the line into caricature, and creating a Hoover that is all too human, making for an all the more unsettling look at absolute power run amuck. Where the film stumbles is the love story at its core: Hoover’s relationship with longtime aide Clyde Tolson (Armie Hammer). In the hands of an openly-gay director like Gus Van Sant, this could have been a heartbreaking, tender story of forbidden (unrequited?) love, but Eastwood seems to tiptoe around their romance, with far too much delicacy and deference. The film works well when recreating the famous crimes and investigations which Hoover made his name on (the Lindbergh kidnapping,...
- 3/7/2012
- by The Hollywood Interview.com
- The Hollywood Interview
Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard (Il Gattopardo) was made in 1963, but is set just over a century earlier, during the Risorgimento, when Garibaldi fought for Italy to be united into one kingdom, free of foreign control. To give a personal dimension to the changes taking place in the region, the film portrays their influence on one aristocratic family in Sicily. Burt Lancaster plays The Prince of Salina, the family’s grizzled patriarch, who seems to adopt a practical attitude to the changes. As the wealth and influence of his class slowly declines, he sees that it is wise to support unification, progress, and the rise of the middle class. At the same time, his aging but still handsome face expresses a quiet melancholy as he sees that aristocratic traditions of piety, dignity, fastidiousness and seclusion are going to die with him. He is too old to take part personally in his family’s reinvention,...
- 2/27/2012
- by Alison Frank
- The Moving Arts Journal
The Italian director's 1970 expressionist masterpiece offered a blueprint for a new kind of Hollywood film, which is why Coppola, Spielberg, Scorsese and co owe him a huge debt
Bernardo Bertolucci's expressionist masterpiece of 1970, The Conformist, is the movie that plugs postwar Italian cinema firmly and directly into the emerging 1970s renaissance in Hollywood film-making. Its account of the neuroses and self-loathing of a sexually confused would-be fascist (Jean-Louis Trintignant) aching to fit in in 1938 Rome, who is despatched to Paris to murder his former, anti-fascist college professor, was deemed an instant classic on release.
It was, and is, a highly self-conscious and stylistically venturesome pinnacle of late modernism, drawing from the full range of recent Italian movie history: a little neo-neorealism, a lot of stark and blinding Antonioni-style mise-en-scène, some moments redolent of Fellini. And it was all framed within an evocation of the frivolous fascist-era film-making style derided...
Bernardo Bertolucci's expressionist masterpiece of 1970, The Conformist, is the movie that plugs postwar Italian cinema firmly and directly into the emerging 1970s renaissance in Hollywood film-making. Its account of the neuroses and self-loathing of a sexually confused would-be fascist (Jean-Louis Trintignant) aching to fit in in 1938 Rome, who is despatched to Paris to murder his former, anti-fascist college professor, was deemed an instant classic on release.
It was, and is, a highly self-conscious and stylistically venturesome pinnacle of late modernism, drawing from the full range of recent Italian movie history: a little neo-neorealism, a lot of stark and blinding Antonioni-style mise-en-scène, some moments redolent of Fellini. And it was all framed within an evocation of the frivolous fascist-era film-making style derided...
- 2/22/2012
- by John Patterson
- The Guardian - Film News
Anna Magnani in (what looks like) Luchino Visconti's Bellissima At the end of Giuseppe Tornatore's Best Foreign Language Film Oscar winner Cinema Paradiso, small-town projectionist Philippe Noiret has died and the Nuovo Cinema Paradiso has become a pile of rubble. The bratty Italian boy Salvatore Cascio has grown into the classy Frenchman Jacques Perrin (like Noiret, dubbed in Italian), a filmmaker who sits to watch a mysterious reel of film the deceased projectionist had left him. It turns out the reel contains clips from films censored by the prudish local parish priest, whose family values found kisses, embraces, and bare breasts and legs a danger to society. Now, who's doing all that kissing, embracing, and breast/leg-displaying in that film reel? (Please scroll down for the Cinema Paradiso clip.) Here are the ones I recognize: Silvana Mangano and Vittorio Gassman in Giuseppe De Santis' Bitter Rice (1949); Mangano...
- 2/14/2012
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
"TCM Remembers 2011" is out. Remembered by Turner Classic Movies are many of those in the film world who left us this past year. As always, this latest "TCM Remembers" entry is a classy, immensely moving compilation. The haunting background song is "Before You Go," by Ok Sweetheart.
Among those featured in "TCM Remembers 2011" are Farley Granger, the star of Luchino Visconti's Senso and Alfred Hitchcock's Rope and Strangers on a Train; Oscar-nominated Australian actress Diane Cilento (Tom Jones, Hombre), formerly married to Sean Connery; and two-time Oscar nominee Peter Falk (Murder, Inc., Pocketful of Miracles, The Great Race), best remembered as television's Columbo. Or, for those into arthouse fare, for playing an angel in Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire.
Also, Jane Russell, whose cleavage and sensuous lips in Howard Hughes' The Outlaw left the puritans of the Production Code Association apoplectic; another Australian performer, Googie Withers, among...
Among those featured in "TCM Remembers 2011" are Farley Granger, the star of Luchino Visconti's Senso and Alfred Hitchcock's Rope and Strangers on a Train; Oscar-nominated Australian actress Diane Cilento (Tom Jones, Hombre), formerly married to Sean Connery; and two-time Oscar nominee Peter Falk (Murder, Inc., Pocketful of Miracles, The Great Race), best remembered as television's Columbo. Or, for those into arthouse fare, for playing an angel in Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire.
Also, Jane Russell, whose cleavage and sensuous lips in Howard Hughes' The Outlaw left the puritans of the Production Code Association apoplectic; another Australian performer, Googie Withers, among...
- 12/14/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
I’ve finally made it to the grand master of the bravura sequence, or, more specifically, of the ending bravura sequence, King Vidor.
It isn’t surprising that a producer as knowledgeable as Selznick often ran to the services of the two major champions of “slice of cake” cinema and strong sequences, Hitchcock (Rebecca, Spellbound, Notorious, The Paradine Case) and Vidor (Bird of Paradise, Duel in the Sun, Light’s Diamond Jubilee, even Ruby Gentry), who, without a doubt, made the best films for Selznick.
Love Never Dies, Wild Oranges, Hallelujah, Our Daily Bread, Comrade X, Duel in the Sun, The Fountainhead, Ruby Gentry and their terrific denouements once made me write that Vidor was a director of film endings. No doubt I was exaggerating, but it isn’t for nothing that he hesitated for a long time between several different endings for The Crowd. I was also exaggerating because...
It isn’t surprising that a producer as knowledgeable as Selznick often ran to the services of the two major champions of “slice of cake” cinema and strong sequences, Hitchcock (Rebecca, Spellbound, Notorious, The Paradine Case) and Vidor (Bird of Paradise, Duel in the Sun, Light’s Diamond Jubilee, even Ruby Gentry), who, without a doubt, made the best films for Selznick.
Love Never Dies, Wild Oranges, Hallelujah, Our Daily Bread, Comrade X, Duel in the Sun, The Fountainhead, Ruby Gentry and their terrific denouements once made me write that Vidor was a director of film endings. No doubt I was exaggerating, but it isn’t for nothing that he hesitated for a long time between several different endings for The Crowd. I was also exaggerating because...
- 12/12/2011
- MUBI
The luminous star of 8½ and The Leopard, Claudia Cardinale lit up the screen in the 1960s. She talks to Steve Rose about life as a muse, her 'man's voice' – and never going naked
Being in London is making Claudia Cardinale nostalgic. The Italian actor remembers shooting one of her first films here, in 1959: Upstairs and Downstairs, a forgotten domestic comedy. She met the Queen at the premiere of West Side Story in Leicester Square in 1962, and looked the more regal of the two. She came here to see one of Marlene Dietrich's last concerts, in 1973, with her friend and regular director Luchino Visconti. "In his room he kept a signed photo of Marlene Dietrich, in her costume. Fantastic!"
This time, she's here for the London Turkish film festival, which opened last month with a new film starring herself; but on a quiet afternoon in a Mayfair hotel, the...
Being in London is making Claudia Cardinale nostalgic. The Italian actor remembers shooting one of her first films here, in 1959: Upstairs and Downstairs, a forgotten domestic comedy. She met the Queen at the premiere of West Side Story in Leicester Square in 1962, and looked the more regal of the two. She came here to see one of Marlene Dietrich's last concerts, in 1973, with her friend and regular director Luchino Visconti. "In his room he kept a signed photo of Marlene Dietrich, in her costume. Fantastic!"
This time, she's here for the London Turkish film festival, which opened last month with a new film starring herself; but on a quiet afternoon in a Mayfair hotel, the...
- 12/8/2011
- by Steve Rose
- The Guardian - Film News
From just the first few minutes into Once Upon a Time in the West its magnificence is immediately evident. What is perhaps Leone’s best western opens with a beautifully orchestrated sequence that sees three unnamed gunmen awaiting the arrival of train and one of its passengers, ‘Harmonica’ (Charles Bronson). Leone builds tension in this scene using every tool at his disposal, most obviously in the effective use of a soundscape that manipulates sound effects and the score so as to control the audience’s reactions down to the finest detail. His almost patented use of wide shots and close-ups also both establishes and develops whilst at the same time never losing any engagement with the viewer. The opening is a lesson in filmmaking from one of cinema’s greatest experts and the excellence on display here continues throughout.
The fact that the film begins with the arrival of a...
The fact that the film begins with the arrival of a...
- 9/2/2011
- by Craig Skinner
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Claudia Cardinale, Burt Lancaster, Alain Delon, The Leopard Burt Lancaster is Turner Classic Movies' "Summer Under the Stars" featured star today, August 25. TCM is presenting 11 Burt Lancaster movies, including two premieres: The Leopard and Scorpio. [Burt Lancaster Movie Schedule.] A powerful but hammy leading man who developed into a first-rate mature actor-star in movies such as Luchino Visconti's Conversation Piece and Louis Malle's Atlantic City, Lancaster had a long, eclectic, and prestigious career both in Hollywood and abroad. Imagine Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, James Stewart, Clark Gable, or John Wayne working with Visconti and Malle, not to mention Bernardo Bertolucci (Novecento / 1900), John Cassavetes (A Child Is Waiting), and Bill Forsyth (Local Hero). TCM is now showing Cassavetes' A Child Is Waiting (1963), quite possibly the director's most accessible — i.e., commercial — effort. Produced by Stanley Kramer, a filmmaker with a strong (at times overly so) sense of (liberal) social commitment, and directed by...
- 8/26/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Boxing BrothersOnly 3 episodes of Hit Me With Your Best Shot left and here's one of the three! Please join us with your own "best shot" choices for Aliens (July 13th) and Rebel Without a Cause (July 20th) as we close out the second season in the next two weeks.
Those films will be easier tasks than Luchino Visconti's Rocco And His Brothers (1960), mostly because they're more familiar properties. Visconti offers up so much to ponder in his novelistic film that one viewing might not suffice.
Rocco and His Brothers, which charts the sad aspirational lives of the Pardoni family -- they're country boys who move to the big city (Milan) -- is structured loosely by chapters named after and focusing on each brother from eldest to youngest: Vincenzo (Spiros Focás), Simone (Renato Salvatori), Rocco (Alain Deloin), Ciro (Max Cartier) and Luca (Rocco Vidolazzi). But this family is so codependent...
Those films will be easier tasks than Luchino Visconti's Rocco And His Brothers (1960), mostly because they're more familiar properties. Visconti offers up so much to ponder in his novelistic film that one viewing might not suffice.
Rocco and His Brothers, which charts the sad aspirational lives of the Pardoni family -- they're country boys who move to the big city (Milan) -- is structured loosely by chapters named after and focusing on each brother from eldest to youngest: Vincenzo (Spiros Focás), Simone (Renato Salvatori), Rocco (Alain Deloin), Ciro (Max Cartier) and Luca (Rocco Vidolazzi). But this family is so codependent...
- 7/7/2011
- by NATHANIEL R
- FilmExperience
Her chilly sensuality has hooked directors from Woody Allen to Lars von Trier. Charlotte Rampling talks to Catherine Shoard about her no-go areas, Hollywood 'crap' – and why we might not like her new documentary
If you were to create an installation that captured the essence of Charlotte Rampling, it would almost certainly involve a stuffed lion and a king-sized bed. And you'd probably place them not in a room, but by a bar, on a beach, at the French Riviera. In this way you'd convey the imperious gloss, the fearsome sensuality, the hint of the ridiculous in Rampling's eat-you-for-breakfast pose.
As luck would have it, this is exactly the scene when we sit down to talk in Cannes. There is a stuffed lion, there is a king-sized bed. Impervious to the taxidermical horror behind her, Rampling perches on a pouffe and fixes me with her laser gaze. The lion peeps over her shoulder; by comparison,...
If you were to create an installation that captured the essence of Charlotte Rampling, it would almost certainly involve a stuffed lion and a king-sized bed. And you'd probably place them not in a room, but by a bar, on a beach, at the French Riviera. In this way you'd convey the imperious gloss, the fearsome sensuality, the hint of the ridiculous in Rampling's eat-you-for-breakfast pose.
As luck would have it, this is exactly the scene when we sit down to talk in Cannes. There is a stuffed lion, there is a king-sized bed. Impervious to the taxidermical horror behind her, Rampling perches on a pouffe and fixes me with her laser gaze. The lion peeps over her shoulder; by comparison,...
- 5/19/2011
- by Catherine Shoard
- The Guardian - Film News
DVD Playhouse—April 2011
By
Allen Gardner
Hereafter (Warner Bros.) Clint Eastwood’s spiritual thriller follows a trio of characters whose seemingly disparate paths converge: Matt Damon as a blue collar Joe who tries to fight against his psychic powers that see “the other side,” Cecile de France as a journalist who somehow survives the tsunami that crushed Indonesia, and a London schoolboy (Frankie and George McLaren) who seeks answers after losing his twin brother. Like all of Eastwood’s films, the narrative construction is tight as a drum, with solid work by all involved. That said, “solid” would have to be the operative word to describe the proceedings here, as well as “unremarkable” and “uninvolving” on an emotional level. Perhaps we expect too much when we see Clint’s name on a film these days, but that’s the flip side of being one of the best. Blu-ray/DVD combo pack.
By
Allen Gardner
Hereafter (Warner Bros.) Clint Eastwood’s spiritual thriller follows a trio of characters whose seemingly disparate paths converge: Matt Damon as a blue collar Joe who tries to fight against his psychic powers that see “the other side,” Cecile de France as a journalist who somehow survives the tsunami that crushed Indonesia, and a London schoolboy (Frankie and George McLaren) who seeks answers after losing his twin brother. Like all of Eastwood’s films, the narrative construction is tight as a drum, with solid work by all involved. That said, “solid” would have to be the operative word to describe the proceedings here, as well as “unremarkable” and “uninvolving” on an emotional level. Perhaps we expect too much when we see Clint’s name on a film these days, but that’s the flip side of being one of the best. Blu-ray/DVD combo pack.
- 4/6/2011
- by The Hollywood Interview.com
- The Hollywood Interview
DVD Playhouse—April 2011
By
Allen Gardner
Hereafter (Warner Bros.) Clint Eastwood’s spiritual thriller follows a trio of characters whose seemingly disparate paths converge: Matt Damon as a blue collar Joe who tries to fight against his psychic powers that see “the other side,” Cecile de France as a journalist who somehow survives the tsunami that crushed Indonesia, and a London schoolboy (Frankie and George McLaren) who seeks answers after losing his twin brother. Like all of Eastwood’s films, the narrative construction is tight as a drum, with solid work by all involved. That said, “solid” would have to be the operative word to describe the proceedings here, as well as “unremarkable” and “uninvolving” on an emotional level. Perhaps we expect too much when we see Clint’s name on a film these days, but that’s the flip side of being one of the best. Blu-ray/DVD combo pack.
By
Allen Gardner
Hereafter (Warner Bros.) Clint Eastwood’s spiritual thriller follows a trio of characters whose seemingly disparate paths converge: Matt Damon as a blue collar Joe who tries to fight against his psychic powers that see “the other side,” Cecile de France as a journalist who somehow survives the tsunami that crushed Indonesia, and a London schoolboy (Frankie and George McLaren) who seeks answers after losing his twin brother. Like all of Eastwood’s films, the narrative construction is tight as a drum, with solid work by all involved. That said, “solid” would have to be the operative word to describe the proceedings here, as well as “unremarkable” and “uninvolving” on an emotional level. Perhaps we expect too much when we see Clint’s name on a film these days, but that’s the flip side of being one of the best. Blu-ray/DVD combo pack.
- 4/6/2011
- by The Hollywood Interview.com
- The Hollywood Interview
Actor who rose to fame in Hitchcock's Rope and Strangers On a Train, but refused to conform to Hollywood pressures
Early on in his career, the actor Farley Granger, who has died aged 85, worked with several of the world's greatest directors, including Alfred Hitchcock on Rope (1948) and Strangers On a Train (1951), Nicholas Ray on They Live By Night (1949) and Luchino Visconti on Senso (1953). Yet Granger failed to sustain the momentum of those years, meandering into television, some stage work and often indifferent European and American movies.
The reasons were complicated, owing much to his sexuality and an unwillingness to conform to Hollywood pressures, notably from his contract studio, MGM, and Samuel Goldwyn. Granger refused to play the publicity or marrying game common among gay and bisexual stars and turned down roles he considered unsuitable, earning a reputation – in his own words – for being "a naughty boy".
He was also the victim of bad luck,...
Early on in his career, the actor Farley Granger, who has died aged 85, worked with several of the world's greatest directors, including Alfred Hitchcock on Rope (1948) and Strangers On a Train (1951), Nicholas Ray on They Live By Night (1949) and Luchino Visconti on Senso (1953). Yet Granger failed to sustain the momentum of those years, meandering into television, some stage work and often indifferent European and American movies.
The reasons were complicated, owing much to his sexuality and an unwillingness to conform to Hollywood pressures, notably from his contract studio, MGM, and Samuel Goldwyn. Granger refused to play the publicity or marrying game common among gay and bisexual stars and turned down roles he considered unsuitable, earning a reputation – in his own words – for being "a naughty boy".
He was also the victim of bad luck,...
- 3/29/2011
- by Brian Baxter
- The Guardian - Film News
Another film legend and link to Hollywood’s great past has left us - Farley Granger has died, aged 85.
He passed away on Sunday of natural causes at his home in Manhattan.
My indelible memories of Granger are from his two works with one of my favourite directors, proving to be an early casting success story in Alfred Hitchcock’s career. Hitch used him twice, both times as seemingly well-to-do young men who through that little devil on his shoulder, giving into seduction and through tapping into that darker side we all we have within us, became not completely as wholesome as his boyish good looks and well-mannered demeanor would suggest.
He is of course more sympathetic in Strangers on a Train as Guy Haines, a guy who unknowingly to him after making a throw-a-way comment to Bruno Anthony (Robert Walker) on a train about wishing his adulterous wife was dead,...
He passed away on Sunday of natural causes at his home in Manhattan.
My indelible memories of Granger are from his two works with one of my favourite directors, proving to be an early casting success story in Alfred Hitchcock’s career. Hitch used him twice, both times as seemingly well-to-do young men who through that little devil on his shoulder, giving into seduction and through tapping into that darker side we all we have within us, became not completely as wholesome as his boyish good looks and well-mannered demeanor would suggest.
He is of course more sympathetic in Strangers on a Train as Guy Haines, a guy who unknowingly to him after making a throw-a-way comment to Bruno Anthony (Robert Walker) on a train about wishing his adulterous wife was dead,...
- 3/29/2011
- by Matt Holmes
- Obsessed with Film
Best known for lead roles in two of Alfred Hitchcock’s most famous films, Strangers On A Train (1951) and Rope (1948), Mr. Granger had a long career that included starring roles in several Film Noirs including the classic They Live By Night (1948). Mr. Granger spent time in Europe where he starred in Lucio Visconti’s Senso (1954 – which screened at this year’s St. Louis International Film Festival). Granger appeared in the sleazy Giallos So Sweet So Dead (1972 – Aka: The Slasher Is A Sex Maniac) and Amuck (1972) and, back in the states, the 80′s slasher standard The Prowler (1980). Farley Granger was 85.
From The Hollywood Reporter:
Farley Granger, who played the likable tennis pro who was thrust into a murder exchange in Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train in 1951, died Sunday of natural causes in New York. He was 85.
Two years earlier in 1948, Granger had won acclaim for another Hitchcock murder thriller,...
From The Hollywood Reporter:
Farley Granger, who played the likable tennis pro who was thrust into a murder exchange in Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train in 1951, died Sunday of natural causes in New York. He was 85.
Two years earlier in 1948, Granger had won acclaim for another Hitchcock murder thriller,...
- 3/29/2011
- by Tom Stockman
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Senso (1954) Direction: Luchino Visconti Cast: Alida Valli, Farley Granger, Heinz Moog, Nina Morelli, Massimo Girotti, Christian Marquand, Sergio Fantoni Screenplay: Suso Cecchi d'Amico, Luchino Visconti; from Camillo Boito's novella Highly Recommended Alida Valli, Farley Granger, Senso Critical consensus regards Luchino Visconti's Senso as a radical departure, a sign of the director's shift in focus from the gritty world of downtrodden proles (such as in his neorealist classics Ossessione and La Terra Trema) to a rather more exciting historical fantasy involving the illicit romance between Countess Serpieri (Alida Valli) and Lieutenant Mahler (Farley Granger) during the Italian revolt against Austria — shot in radiant three-strip Technicolor to boot. A rather more defensible truism portrays Senso as a dry run for Visconti's later adaptation of Giuseppe di Lampedusa's The Leopard. There are obvious parallels between the two: male leads played by American actors (Granger in Senso, Burt Lancaster in The Leopard), brilliant color cinematography,...
- 3/14/2011
- by Dan Erdman
- Alt Film Guide
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