Claudia Cardinale

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A documentary on the chaotic production of Werner Herzog’s epic Fitzcarraldo (1982), showing how the film managed to get made despite problems that would have floored a less obsessively driven director.

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Les Blank’s “Burden of Dreams” is one of the most remarkable documentaries ever made about the making of a movie. There are at least two reasons for that. One is that the movie being made, Werner Herzog’s “Fitzcarraldo,” involved some of the most torturous and dangerous on-location shooting experiences in film history. The other is that the documentary is by Les Blank, himself a brilliant filmmaker, who is unafraid to ask difficult questions and portray Herzog, warts and all.Read More »

Visconti’s retelling of the Electra story starts with Sandra/Electra (Cardinale) returning to her ancestral home in Italy – and reviving an intimate involvement with her brother (Sorel) which troubles her naive American husband (Craig) – on the eve of an official ceremony commemorating the death of her Jewish father in a Nazi concentration camp. As ever with Visconti, he is ambivalently drawn to the decadent society he is ostensibly criticising; and Armando Nannuzzi’s camera lovingly caresses the creaking old mansion, set in a landscape of crumbling ruins, where the incestuous siblings determine to wreak revenge on the mother (Bell) and stepfather (Ricci) who supposedly denounced their father. Something like a Verdi opera without the music, the result may not quite achieve tragedy, but it looks marvellous. The title, culled from a poem by Leopardi, has been better rendered as ‘Twinkling Stars of the Bear’.Read More »

The story of an exchange student from Turkey and his struggle to fit in Italy. (~IMDb)
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Signora Enrica (Turkish: Sinyora Enrica ile İtalyan Olmak) is a 2010 Italo-Turkish comedy-drama film, written and directed by Ali İlhan, starring Claudia Cardinale as an elderly Italian woman who takes in a young Turkish exchange student.Read More »

This tiresome comedy features pop singer Enzo Jannacci as Amedeo, a country rube who comes to Vatican City seeking a personal audience with the Pope. Detailing Amedeo’s battle with officious Vatican bureaucrats and bungling attempts to catch the Pope off-guard, the film rarely rises to the level of director Marco Ferreri’s more subversive farces and resembles nothing more than a 1970s Neapolitan-style Pauly Shore vehicle. Italian film buffs will still appreciate the cast, which includes Ugo Tognazzi and Michel Piccoli of La Cage aux Folles as well as Claudia Cardinale, Vittorio Gassman, and Alain Cuny. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie GuideRead More »

Early 1970s. Amedeo is a poor Italian immigrant living in Australia for twenty years. Seeking to marry an Italian wife, he corresponds with Carmela, a pretty girl from Rome. They do not reveal their true identities and do not mention their hardships in their letters. Carmela is actually a prostitute seeking an opportunity to change her life style. Amedeo, embarrassed about his looks, sends a photograph to Carmela of his handsome friend Giuseppe. Finally, Carmela lands in Melbourne. Amedeo meets Carmela at the airport and he is struck by her beauty. Thinking he will be rejected because of his looks, he decides to tell Carmela that he is Giuseppe, and he reserves to tell her the truth at a later moment. This starts a three day eventful journey across Eastern Australia. Carmela will soon become better acquainted with Amedeo and she learns of his hardships as an immigrant. She eventually meets the real Giuseppe, however, she believes that he is her betrothed groom, Amedeo. She quickly learns Giuseppe’s true shady intentions. In fact, she finds herself living in a red light district and then escapes. Amedeo and Carmela finally find true happiness together.Read More »