Italy in films

Among the many films made on Italy, we've chosen a few which we think represent important aspects of Italy and can give a real feeling of the country.

La dolce vita

Besides being a masterpiece of the world cinema, La dolce vita is a film that evokes very strongly the Italy of the early '60s and its "boom economico", the period of renewed prosperity after the war, with all its "sweet life" promises. The three-hour-long, black-and-white film by director Federico Fellini has as its main character a Roman tabloid reporter (played by Marcello Mastroianni) chasing stories and women alike through a jungle of Roman opulence and decadence.
It affords views of Rome's beauty spots, as in the most memorable scene of Anita Ekberg's bath in the Trevi Fountain or her glimpse of the city from the top of St. Peter's. Via Veneto, the street of the glamorous and famous nouveaux riches, is the constant setting, with Mastroianni permanently sitting at an outdoor cafe table waiting for things to happen. Which they invariably do, in a maze of parties, nightclubs, celebrity frolics and tragedies with Rome's international community as background.

Five stars.

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The Agony and the Ecstasy

The Agony and the Ecstasy is a beautifully-made film on the life of Michaelangelo. Based on the book by Irving Stone, with Charlton Heston in the role of the greatest sculptor ever lived and Rex Harrison as the pope Julius II, commissioning him to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. The film portrays the conflict between these two great personalities and their different views of the world. Directed by Carol Reed in 1965, but every bit as interesting today.
Among other things, it offers views of the Apuane Alps, the mountains near Lucca from which the white Carrara marble is extracted, with Michaelangelo working in a quarry. You can say that it was the proximity of this range of mountains to Florence, where he worked, that helped the great genius.
The film won 5 Oscar Nominations, including one for Best Cinematography, and it's not difficult to see why if you watch the splendid scenes accompanied by music in Rome.
Historically extremely intriguing, especially to see how people worked in the marble quarries in the 1500s. Heston makes a very convincing Michelangelo (this is the original Italian spelling, by the way), introvert and rebellious.
Colour.

Four stars.

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Il Postino (The Postman)

By the English director Michael Radford, Il Postino stars the Neapolitan actor Massimo Troisi, best known for his comic talent. Elegiac and deeply moving film, made even more so by the fact that Troisi, who plays the part of a provincial hero who gets killed during a demonstration, died the day after completion of the movie in 1995.
The film is remarkable not only for Troisi's qualities of natural acting, but also for the atmosphere it creates of a place out of space and time.
Although the story is set in Capri, the film was actually shot in an island near Capri. The scenery is enchanting.
English subtitles. Colour.

Five stars.

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Caro Diario (Dear Diary)

Nanni Moretti, of the new generation of Italian filmmakers, directs and stars in Caro Diario, which comprises three parts. As the title suggests, they are autobiographical episodes. In the first, he travels around Rome in his Vespa. In the second, he goes from one island to the other in Southern Italy, in search of the perfect place on Earth. In the third, he recounts his experience of cancer treatment both in the orthodox and alternative medicine fields.
Moretti can be very funny even when he deals with unfunny subjects.
English subtitles. Colour.

Four stars.

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Fellini's Roma

Another of Fellini's classics. Roma is made up of many little sketches of the life of this amazing city, which is helpful if you want to understand Rome without actually leaving your dining room. It certainly makes people enter the spirit of Rome, and provides insights into the everyday life of the Eternal City. Archaelogical sites, museums, religious connections, traffic, streetlife, and what else. Perhaps Fellini was trying the convey the Rome which inhabits his imagination, but the effect is still that of powerfully transporting the viewers into the real Roma.
English subtitles. Colour.

Five stars.

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