EDINBURGH
- GLASGOW - LONDON from
27 SEPTEMBER to 29 NOVEMBER 2007 |
 |
Old-Fashioned
World
Piccolo mondo antico(15)
1941 106 mins
Cast
Alida Valli, Massimo Serato
Dir
Mario Soldati
When a young nobleman in 19th century
Lombardy marries a peasant girl, it raises the
ire of the local nobility, and leads t o disastrous
consequences. Alida Valli, best known to audiences
overseas as the enigmatic Anna in The Third Man,
is magnificent as a young woman driven to the
brink of insanity by a terribly tragedy in her
marriage.
|
London 3 October
Glasgow 21 October
Edinburgh 23 October
|
|
Bellissima(15)
1951 110 mins
Cast Anna Magnani, Walter Chiari
Dir Luchino Visconti
Visconti’s film centres on a child actor
competition at Cinecittà studios, and the
ensuing backstage politics. An affectionate satire
on moviemaking and social aspirations in Italy,
it stars the marvellous Magnani, who unleashes
her trademark verbal attacks on anyone who gets
in the way of her daughter entering and winning
the contest.
|
Edinburgh 27 September
London 3 October
Glasgow 4 Novr |
|
Bread,
Love, and Dreams
Pane, amore e fantasia(12)
1953
90 mins
Cast Gina Lollobrigida, Vittorio De Sica
Dir Luigi Comencini
“Europe’s
Biggest Sex Bomb in an All-Out Explosion”
screamed the posters, but Comencini’s film
is really a good-natured comedy about a newly
arrived village marshall and his romantic complications.
De Sica acted in popular comedies to finance his
own films and he does his best work here, paired
with the vivacious Gina Lollobrigida.
|
London 4 October
Edinburgh 11 October |
|
The
Lady Without Camelias
La Signora senza camelie(15)
1953 106 mins
Cast Lucia Bosé, Andrea
Checchi
Dir Michelangelo Antonioni
In this stinging rebuke to the Italian film
indus try, the luminous Lucia Bosé s
tars as a simple shop-girl who is discovered
by a movie producer. However, his jealousy leads
to disaster when he casts her in a Joan of Arc
biopic. Antonioni, who died earlier this year,
uses the studio framework to gleefully dissect
the cruelty and coldness of movie-stardom. This
was a groundbreaking film for its representation
of the relationship between art, money, and
stardom.
|
London 4 October
Edinburgh 13 October
Glasgow 11 Novr |
|
Oh,
Sabella!
La Nonna Sabella(15)
1957 95 mins
Cast
Tina Pica, Sylva Koscina
Dir Dino Risi
Grandmother Sabella is determined to see her grandson
married to a wealthy wife while he is equally
determined to wed the girl of his dreams. Directed
by the prolific Dino Risi, the film stars in the
title role the legendary Tina Pica, who began
acting in silent films in 1916 and was a beloved
fixture in Italian cinema for decades.
|
Edinburgh 14 October
London 17 October
Glasgow 4 Nov |
|
The
Widower
Il Vedovo(15)
1959 100 mins
Cast
Franca Valeri, Alberto Sordi
Dir Dino Risi
A rarely-seen gem starring two of Italy’s
greatest comedic stars: Franca Valeri and
Alberto Sordi. Sordi plays a bumbling small-time
industrialist who plots to kill his wife (Valeri).
But the industrious and intelligent Valeri has
a few plans in store for him, in this satire on
upper-class mores.
|
Glasgow 7 Oct
London 17 Oct
Edinburgh 20 Oct |
|
The
Girl with the Suitcase
La Ragazza con la valiglia (15)
1960 103 mins
Cast
Claudia Cardinale, Jacques Perrin
Dir Valerio Zurlini
A nightclub singer (played by Claudia Cardinale)
pursues a wealthy man (who seduced then abandoned
her) to his family home, where she becomes involved
with his teenage brother. The film showcases Zurlini’s
gift for melding melancholic, meditative moods
with a strong political sensibility; it’s
also one of the radiant Cardinale’s first
major films.
|
London 27 September
Edinburgh 29 September Glasgow 30
Sept |
|
Two
Women
La Ciociara(18)
1960 110 mins
Cast
Sophia Loren, Jean-Paul Belmondo
Dir Vittorio De Sica
Sophia Loren plays a woman who flees Rome with
her daughter during the Second
World War and suffers a terrible tragedy along
the way. De Sica’s rarely-seen masterpiece
garnered worldwide acclaim (and an Oscar) for
Loren, proving her talent as a volatile and versatile
actress, as well as the inspiration for Penelope
Cruz in Volver.
|
London 18 Octr
Glasgow 28 Oct
Edinburgh 8 Novr |
|
The
Visitor
La Visita(15)
1963 100 mins
Cast Sandra Milo, François Périer
Dir Antonio Pietrangeli
The Visitor looks at the life of a woman bored
with her love life who goes out with a lowly nebbish
in the hopes of finding something real. Sandra
Milo specialised in playing fiery temptresses
(In 8 and Juliet of the Spirits) but here she
shows real depth as a woman unsure of where to
go in life once her sexuality starts to fade.
|
London 18 October
Edinburgh 10 November Glasgow 18 Nov |
|
I
Knew Her So Well
Io la conoscevo bene(15)
1965 97 mins
Cast
Stefania Sandrelli, Nino Manfredi, Ugo Tognazzi
Dir Antonio Pietrangeli
A young girl from the countryside is seduced by
the temptations of the big city, but is unable
to find any meaningful relationships. Though Sandrelli
(known for her role in The Conformist) would go
on to become an Italian sex symbol, her performance
here is a masterpiece of crushed innocence and
slow-building helplessness in a bittersweet comedy
which reinforced her popular screen image as the
innocent broken by cruel social reality.
|
London 24 October
Glasgow 28 Oct
Edinburgh 11 November |
|
Juliet
of the Spirits
Giulietta degli spiriti (15)
1965 148 mins
Cast
Giulietta Masina, Mario Pisu, Valentina Cortese
Dir Federico Fellini
It’s difficult not to read this tale of
a lonely housewife (played by Fellini’s
wife, the charming Giulietta Masina) ignored by
her husband as autobiographical confession. But
as Giulietta’s visions start to encroach
on her reality, Fellini delivers a masterful mix
of dream-like imagery to match Masina’s
pixie-like innocence.
|
London 24 October
Edinburgh 15 November
Glasgow 18 Nov |
|
Theorem
Teorema(15)
1968 98 mins
Cast Terence Stamp, Silvana Mangano, Laura Betti
Dir Pier Paolo Pasolini
Pasolini’s finest merging of Catholic iconography
with his Socialist politics, Teorema casts Stamp
as a mysterious stranger who infiltrates a wealthy
household. The film belongs to Silvana Mangano
as the mother seduced by Stamp’s Christ/Devil
figure. Here Pasolini achieved his most perfect
fusion of Marxism and religion with a film that
is both political allegory and mystical fable.
|
Glasgow 7 Oct
London 25 October
Edinburgh 17 November |
|
A
Drama of Jealousy
Dramma della gelosia(15)
1970 107 mins
Cast
Monica Vitti, Marcello Mastroianni, Giancarlo
Giannini
Dir Ettore Scola
A legendary comic farce with few equals in Italian
cinema, this hysterical soap opera features a
dream-team of actors anchored by the sublime Monica
Vitti as the object of two men’s affections.
It is Intelligently entertaining, with its eclectic
humour…and polished performance.
|
Glasgow 21 Oct
London 25 October
Edinburgh 18 November |
|
The
Seduction of Mimi
Mìmi metallurgico ferito nell’onore
(18)
1972 121 mins
Cast
Mariangela Melato, Giancarlo Giannini
Dir Lina Wertmüller
Mimi is a dockworker who falls into a torrid affair
with a blonde communist organizer (Melato) in
this satiric combination of two beloved Italian
pastimes (sex and politics). The provocative Lina
Wertmüller reteamed with Melato and Giannini
for the notorious Swept Away.
|
Glasgow 14 Oct
London 31 October
Edinburgh 22 November |
|
The
Bishop’s Bedroom
La Stanza del vescovo(15)
1977 110 mins
Cast
Ornella Muti, Ugo Tognazzi
Dir Dino Risi
Ugo Tognazzi plays a wealthy man who finds himself
attracted to his repressed sister-inlaw (Ornella
Muti, named by Marlene Dietrich as her cinematic
heir). But when Patrick Dewaere is also attracted
to Muti, it sets off a chain of events that leads
to jealousy, affairs, and finally murder in Risi’s
captivating melodrama.
|
London 31 October
Glasgow 11 Nov
Edinburgh 29 November |
|
| |
|