Alida Valli

An experiment between film noir and digital footage of a road trip

Cinecitta is today known as the center of the Italian film industry. But there is a dark past. The film city was solemnly inaugurated in 1937 by Mussolini. Here, propaganda films would be produced to strengthen the dictator's position.

The story of Italian cinema under Fascism, a sophisticated film industry built around the founding of the Cinecittà studios and the successful birth of a domestic star system, populated by very peculiar artists among whom stood out several beautiful, magnetic, special actresses; a dark story of war, drugs, sex, censorship and tragedy.

A film where anything can happen - the hero and the heroine changes their faces, age, look, names, and so on. The only same thing: The love between man and woman... in an archetypical love story cut from 500 classics from all around the world.

The most spectacular Easter celebration in the World. Hosts of hooded Penitents parade through the ancient, narrow streets of the Old Town in time-honored ritual. But for one celebrant this Holy Week is different. For him Semana Santa is a time to kill. As the death toll mounts, it falls to detective Maria Delgado - mistrusted outsider from Madrid - to stop the bizarre killings.

Documentary about the shooting of 'Suspiria' that details everything that lovers of horror genre can desire, including the inspiration of the plot, the director, the cast, the style, the music and, of course, its worldwide success. Argento, Daria Nicolodi, Jessica Harper, Udo Kier, Stafania Casini, Giuseppe Colombo, Luciano Tovoli and several members of the progressive rock band Goblin (Claudio Simonetti, Fabio Pignatelli, Massino Marante) are interviewed to learn about their work in the film.

Sofia is a young student in an acting class who learns some of the secrets of the trade from three great actresses: Mariangela Melato teaches her to lie, Stefania Sandrelli teaches her to tell the truth, and Alida Valli teaches her about the illusion of art. Lies, truth, and illusion that Sofia tries to apply to everyday life, to her relationship with her man and her best friend.

Half-Italian Gioia loves Max, but leaves her son's son to cheat her as a fiancé. When Mama invites the family to the Italian winery for Grandpa's 80th birthday, the feelings are on the table alongside pasta, pesto and vino, because Gioia happens to meet Max again ...

Sofia, a budding young theater actress, unwittingly discovers that Bruno, her beloved acting teacher, is gay. Heartbroken and determined to flee as far away from him as possible, she meets a young girl on the train who gives birth and abandons the baby. Sofia makes a life-changing decision: she takes the child and passes him off as her own son, naming him Bruno.

Documentary about the making and distribution of Al Festa's film "Fatal Frames".

Alex Ritt, a music video director comes to Italy to direct a video for pop sensation Stefania Stella. He soon encounters a mysterious killer who videotapes his victims for the police. As the horrible murders continue, Ritt is unknowingly pushed into the killer's games and he soon becomes a target of the police. The video-killer is on the loose and Ritt must find out the truth before it's too late.

For 16 years Miss Bentley has been spending April at an elegant hillside villa on Lake Como. This year, 1937, her London society artist father has recently died and the only other English-speaking guests are brash Americans. Then Major Wilshaw arrives. He suggests they meet for cocktails and Miss Bentley stands him up -- not even thinking about it -- as she helps the new nanny of an Italian family settle in. Miss Beaumont, a tall, young American who has dropped out of finishing school in Switzerland, is bored and finds some amusement in flirting with the major, whose libido is awakened for the first time since before the great war. And Miss Bentley now finds more about the major to admire than his ears.

Marco, a television journalist, reads "red lies" on his teletext system in order to gather material on the homosexual world for a story he's working on. Unfortunately, he is implicated in a series of murders in which the victims are all gay. Marco becomes a suspect and is forced to investigate the crimes himself in order to prove his innocence.

Carla Aldrovandi, a gynecologist, and her husband Marco Canova, a magistrate live on the front line of criminal and political powers in Italy. She is surrounded by terror and threats.

In a small Tuscan village that's waiting for the local festival to commence, amidst confusion about the fall of Communism, the lives of some dazed characters intertwine.

A young restorer is commissioned a job at an old villa which belongs to an aging countess.

The widow of a thief learns that the chateau she lives in has a fortune in gold hidden somewhere.

The survivor of a concentration camp finds out that her lover, a lesbian, is having an affair with a protegee.

Young terrorist Laura shoots both a judge and a comrade, and over time her violent act becomes a thread linking the lives and fates of several other women. Each has her own secret, including the lawyer who listens to Laura as if in a ‘trance’: moments before, she discovered her husband was cheating.

Paolo Coniglio is a naive and clumsy employee in a comics publishing house, bullied by his manager and his terrible future mother-in-law. To escape his dreary daily routine, he finds himself living vivid daydreams with "Dalia", the beautiful heroine of the books that he's translating. One day, though, while shopping, Paolo meets a charming blonde that looks like Dalia, and finds himself trapped in a shady intrigue.

A publisher seeks information on a writer who died long ago.

Who is the mysterious stranger Cecilia met on the street? Why is he suspicious of everyone? She is happily married, has a lovely child and a good job: yet she decides to join him and to become his lover, sharing his destiny right up to its tragic conclusion.

A Yugoslavian man meets a woman in Paris, where he has come to do some research, and their mutual attraction leads to a liaison and shared adventures, not many good.

Illa, a brilliant and somewhat immature girl, involuntarily witnesses a ferocious shootout during a bank robbery. This fact places her at the center of an intrigue in which private life, journalism and investigations are dangerously intertwined.

A young girl's husband rents a lovely home just outside of Madrid so she can spend the last three months of her pregnancy in peace and luxury. Unfortunately, just as they arrive at the home, the girl realizes that it is the place where she had secretly had an illegal abortion some years before.

Verso l'ora zero is an Italian television film from 1980. It is based on the Agatha Christie novel Towards Zero.

A young man returns from Rome to his sister's satanic New York apartment house.

While touring in Italy, a recently-widowed American opera singer has an incestuous relationship with her 15-year-old son to help him overcome his heroin addiction.

A demented nun sliding through morphine addiction into madness, while presiding over a regime of lesbianism, torture and death. Sister Gertrude is the head nurse/nun in a general hospital, whose increasingly psychotic behavior endangers the staff and patients around her.

Eva is a singer in a Noah's Ark themed nightclub, where the guests wear animal masks. She is approached by a stranger who claims to know her and to remember her singing Mozart.

Italian horror movie from 1979.

The death of a multinational company’s chairman induces the three candidates for the chairmanship to plot against one another for control of the business.

Senator Alberici tries to approach the secretariat of his party with a campaign against immorality. In reality the politician is a pervert with homosexual tendencies that he expresses with men and women.

A young poet falls in love with a sophisticated woman who hates poetry. But the poet wants to win her with poetry — and a bit of help from his mum.

Set in a rural area of France in the 19th century, this simple tale tells the story of a servant girl whose life seems marked by grand tragedy, but whose heart is simple and uncomplicated enough not only to endure, but even to attain serenity in the face of her manifold frustrations. Her only friend, to whom she pours out all her troubles, is an old parrot. When the parrot dies, she reverently has it stuffed and continues telling it her woes. This drama is based on a story by Gustave Flaubert.

An American newcomer to a prestigious German ballet academy comes to realize that the school is a front for something sinister amid a series of grisly murders.

Passengers on a European train have been exposed to a deadly disease, and nobody will let them off the train.

A psychiatrist takes complete responsibility when his son is found floating in a swimming pool, stabbed to death. All the evidence points to a young orphan boy as the real murderer. Why is the psychiatrist claiming the murder as his own?

The epic tale of a class struggle in twentieth century Italy, as seen through the eyes of two childhood friends on opposing sides.

A pair of elderly men, friends for 40 years, find their relationship stressed when they set up housekeeping together in order to save money. Exploring similar ground to that covered in Neil Simon's play The Odd Couple, which spawned a movie and a television series, Ce Cher Victor explores the tragic and dramatic aspects of the story. The two friends, meek, sensitive Anselme (Bernard Blier) and blustering Victor (Jacques Dufilho) are swiftly driven apart by circumstances.

A re-edited version of Mario Bava's "Lisa and the Devil" for the U.S. market, including newly filmed scenes involving a possessed Lisa.

A disturbed young woman is kept prisoner in a castle by her aunt for her money. The game-keeper, her guardian, tries to rape her but she escapes. In her flight she meets a man also running away, from two killers.

Lisa is a tourist in an ancient city. When she gets lost, she finds an old mansion in which to shelter. Soon she is sucked into a vortex of deception, debauchery and evil presided over by housekeeper Leandre.

An Italian nobleman seeks help after his paralyzed daughter becomes possessed by the spirit of a malevolent ancestress.

Two writers and their girlfriends visit the castle of an actor who specializes in playing vampire roles. As the night progresses, they begin to wonder if the man is an actor playing a vampire, or a vampire playing an actor.

A young Hacienda-owner abuses women due to his traumatic youth while his mother covers for his sadistic actions.

In Italy, the gambler and professor of poetry Daniele Dominici arrives in the seaside town of Rimini and is hired to teach for four months in the local high school replacing another teacher. His relationship with his partner Monica is in crisis and he spends most of the time with his new acquaintances and gamblers Giorgio, Marcello and Gerardo. In classroom, he meets the gorgeous nineteen years old student Vanina Abati, who is Gerardo's girlfriend.

Julie is disturbed by the disappearance of her psychiatrist boyfriend Luca following a bizarre dream where she witnessed him murdered. She travels to a seaside village where he might be and encounters Frank, who tells her Luca has indeed been there. Julie's investigation leads her to the house of Gerta, where the mystery deepens among the odd characters residing at this artists enclave.

A young man returns to his countryside hometown to investigate the unclear circumstances behind the death of his father, ostensibly killed by Fascists in 1936, before his birth. As he unravels a web of lies that seems to encompass the whole town, he finds himself entangled in the same web.

A young physician becomes lonely when his workaholic wife ignores him to concentrate on her professional career. He is befriended by an older female artist who is fond of hallucinogenic mushrooms. When his wife is late for their anniversary celebration, he drinks and takes mushrooms with the artist. He wakes up to find she has died and is fearful he may have accidentally killed her.

In pre-war Italy, a young couple have a baby boy. The father, however, is jealous of his son - and the scene moves to antiquity, where the baby is taken into the desert to be killed. He is rescued, given the name Oedipus, and brought up by the King and Queen of Corinth as their son. One day an oracle informs Oedipus that he is destined to kill his father and marry his mother. Horrified, he flees Corinth and his supposed parents - only to get into a fight and kill an older man on the road…

A unique black comedy consisting of three episodes on the same theme: death. In a circus, trapeze artist Wilma is going to get rid of a rival during a "magic act" performed by an amateur. A strange widow comes to inquire about the services of a new marriage agency. A peasant woman tormented by a bug in her ear barges into a healer's house.

The troubling attraction of a young decorator, Agnès, on a small Spanish island, for a man everyone distrusts, whose wife has mysteriously disappeared.

A deaf and mute vagabond finds a large denomination bill in a Mexico City dump, and while he tries to buy something with it, others try to con him into giving it away.

Also released as Valley of the Swords, this lugubrious US/Spanish co-production features the usual mid-1960s "tax shelter" international cast. Broderick Crawford plays a despotic 10th century Spanish king who, in cahoots with the invading Moors, has banished handsome Castilian nobleman Spartaco Santoni. With the surreptitious aid of Crawford's daughter Teresa Velasquez, Santoni assembles an army to march against the Moors. In keeping with the 13th century epic poem from which this film was derived ("El Poema de Fernan Gonzales") Santoni's path is smoothed by the celestial intervention of patron saints Milan and Santiago. Among the big names picking up a few tax-free dollars in The Castilian are Cesar Romero, Linda Darnell, Alida Valli and Fernando Rey.

A young man becomes enraged when his mother remarries his wealthy uncle after his father dies.

Study of 1960s Milanese social life and its glamorous depravity, as seen through the story of the working class Mario who dreams of social climbing.

Widowed at the age of twenty, Madame Boissière is a real mother hen, excessively brooding over her two sons Robert and Claude. She spoiled the marriage of one and kept the other away from any female presence. The latter runs off and marries a girl from the mountains. When his brother dies, the couple agree to return to live with Madame Boissière, who tries to separate them.

The widows of four missionaries condemned by the Indians to die at the stake, go to the Amazon jungle to pay homage to them.

A suave art thief romances a wealthy duchess, only to enable him to steal a priceless painting from her collection. Complications ensue.

Therese, a café owner, mourns the mysterious disappearance of her husband sixteen years earlier. A tramp arrives in the town and she believes him to be her husband. But he is suffering from amnesia and she tries to bring back his memory of earlier times.

Released from a boarding school of nuns in Como, the seventeen-year-old Milanese Elena Giordani manages to convince her parents to let her spend the summer holidays together with her Genoese friend Diana D'Aquino in her villa in Rapallo.

Agathe Perrin, a wealthy widow in her forties, lives with her ailing father in an estate on the shores of Lac du Bourget, not far from Aix-les-Bains. For the past four years, she has been involved in an affair with a twenty-four-year-old artist, Jackie, that is beginning to weigh heavily on her. The frequent visits of a brilliant Aix doctor to the sick old man's bedside have distracted Agathe from her very young lover. She'd like to send him away, but he clings to her desperately, and we witness the drama of this break-up, both feared and rejected by Agathe. Blinded by jealousy, Jackie decides to leave, but not without behaving like a spoiled, insolent child.

This drama about the Carmelite order of nuns is set during the French Revolution. A young woman seeks refuge with the Carmelites because she is terrified of dying during the upheaval. The longer she associates with the nuns the more she is transformed by their faith and devotion. 

Dr. Génessier is riddled with guilt after an accident that he caused disfigures the face of his daughter, the once beautiful Christiane, who outsiders believe is dead. Dr. Génessier, along with accomplice and laboratory assistant Louise, kidnaps young women and brings them to the Génessier mansion. After rendering his victims unconscious, Dr. Génessier removes their faces and attempts to graft them on to Christiane's.

At the end of the Great War, Arsène Lupin resumed his adventurous life. Theft of three paintings committed by an adversary leads him to the treasure of the Golden Fleece.

The sons of Medea are an Italian "teledramma", broadcast live on 9 June 1959 on the National Program. It became a sensational media event because many viewers, not realizing it was a fiction, perceived the event as real

Salvatore, known as "bread loaf", escapes from Caltanissetta's brewery to find his mother he never met. Before arriving in Venice, he stays in a small sea village where he meets people of various kinds.

Novitiate Ursula leaves the convent and becomes involved with Lambert, who blames her lecherous uncle, the count Ribera, for his sister's death.

Squarciò, a fisherman, lives with his family on a small island off the Dalmatian coast of Italy. Like his fellow villagers, Squarciò struggles against harsh living conditions, a scarcity of fish in nearby waters and exploitation by the local wholesaler. But while the other fishermen continue to use nets, he goes out to the open sea to fish illegally with bombs. But Squarciò borrows money, loses his boat, and in a moment of supreme desperation, has to bomb directly off-shore, causing the hatred and rejection of his fellow fishermen. Trying to save his family, Squarciò and his young sons sail their new boat out beyond the local waters and bomb-fish again. But this time, the sea exacts a terrible toll…

20-year-old Joseph and his 16-year-old sister Suzanne live in the merciless conditions of an intemperate foreign land with their widowed mother. Their mother attempts to exert a hold on her children by involving them in the family's run-down rice plantation. However, the siblings seek liberation, and look for this in their romantic lives. Suzanne becomes involved with Michael and Joseph finds a love interest in Claude.

A sugar-refinery worker flees his Northern Italy town after a woman refuses his marriage proposal.

A troubled and neurotic Italian Countess betrays her entire country for a self-destructive love affair with an Austrian Lieutenant.

Eight-year-old Roger Court is in Venice expecting to reunite with his father, British diplomat Major Court (Trevor Howard), whom he hasn't seen in three years. Roger lives with his Aunt Rose since his mother abandoned him.

Five portraits of actresses in their "common" life, seen as women rather than movie stars.

Forced by her lover to sell her body, Renata is saved from a suicide attempt by Paolo Martelli, an engineer. She asks him to help her find a job. When Paolo's wife humiliates her, Renata gains revenge by seducing the woman's husband.

Toledo, 1825. To save her fiancé, an opponent of the regime, the beautiful Inès agrees to marry the chief of police.

The wife of a mechanic and tester of Alfa Romeo cars becomes the lover of a pilot. The two decide to flee together in Argentina.

1939 : what a beautiful year for Claudia and Jerôme. No sooner do they meet that they are under each other's spell. 1939 : what a horrible year for the two lovers : war breaks out before they can get married. They meet again after the war but the enchantment has vanished. They decide to marry but it will be for reason, not for love. Miracles only happen once.

Fugitive Chris Hale starts over in a small Midwestern town in Ohio, where he befriends Elaine Corelli, a kind-hearted heiress left disabled after a skiing accident. As love blossoms, Hale vows to change his ways, but escaping his past may mean one last job.

Mountain climbers in the Swiss Alps mull over past problems while trying to conquer a perilous peak.

In postwar Vienna, Austria, Holly Martins, a writer of pulp Westerns, arrives penniless as a guest of his childhood chum Harry Lime, only to learn he has died. Martins develops a conspiracy theory after learning of a "third man" present at the time of Harry's death, running into interference from British officer Major Calloway, and falling head-over-heels for Harry's grief-stricken lover, Anna.

Anthology comedy/romance film

The body of a young actress is brought to her home town by the man who loved her. He knows that she wanted all the church bells to ring for three days after she was buried, but is told that this will cost a lot of money. The checks that he writes to the various churches all bounce, but it is the weekend and, in desperation, he prays that a miracle will happen before the banks reopen. It does, but not in the way he hoped.

In London, barrister Anthony Keane takes the case of Maddalena Paradine, a beautiful woman accused of poisoning her blind husband. Though happily married, Keane becomes infatuated with his enigmatic client and convinced of her innocence. His obsession clouds his judgment as he builds a defense implicating her servant, André Latour—an act that leads to devastating consequences both in court and at home.

Eugenia is a daughter of a wealthy but miserly man living a simple life in the provincial town of Saumur. Eugenia's inexperience leads her to fall in love with an unworthy man.

During the German occupation, the only heir of a rich owner of the Roman countryside, in order to escape capture, lives hidden in a cave. To help him there is a young woman who has been in love with him for a long time. However, one day, during one of those daily visits, the boy abuses her.

A compelling portrayal of postwar Rome

One of the most famous movie stars of the moment has a problem with his car. The actor is obliged to stop in a provincial hotel, where he finds himself surrounded by his admirers.

Seduced by count Diego and then abandoned, Adriana finds a job at a large hairdresser shop, so she can lead a dignified life together with her daughter.

Movie adaptation of the Leoncavalo's famous opera. A troupe of traveling actors is being welcomed by villagers in Calabria in the summer of 1866.

After having been captured in a Crimea during a failed attempt to flee overseas, Leo returns in Petersburg for Kira.

At 18, the beautiful and intelligent Kira comes to Petersburg as the Communists consolidate power. She rebuffs a cousin who rises in the Party and may remember the slight. She falls in love with Leo, the son of an aristocrat, who gets into political trouble and never gets out.

A singer saves a heavy alcoholic journalist. Fate has a new meeting for them: the two are found in a police station where she was brought with the accusation of prostitution.

In a girls' school, Maria, a student, is accused of having an affair with the young professor Marini. The main accuser is her classmate Anna, played by Alida Valli.

Alberto Serrani, a mining engineer, meets doctor's daughter Marina, sweet and simple, and the notorious and frivolous Clara who falls for him immediately.

Franco, a young man of noble descent, marries Luisa, daughter of a humble clerk, against his grandmother's will.

Manon escapes with the young nobleman Des Grieux, then becomes a high-class courtesan and finally forced to exile to America.

Set in the Papal States in the first half of the 19th century, it tells the story of the Roman noblewoman Vanina Vanini and her secret love for the Carbonaro Pietro Mirilli. The latter, given his commitments in the underground struggle, decides to abandon his young lover, who is nevertheless willing to marry him. Left alone, Vanina is unable to escape her despair and tries in every way to reunite with her companion, even going so far as to denounce the Carbonari to the Cardinal of Romagna, naming them all except Pietro and revealing the hiding place where they meet. Pietro, learning of Vanina's betrayal, casts her out. Only then does Vanina realize the gravity of her actions and decides to join the Carbonari, even participating in combat operations, during one of which she is wounded. This brings the two young people closer together forever.

An electronic engineer is called by the Hungarian Television Directorate to test the new television installations. He arrives in the capital, Budapest, together with his girlfriend.

A young man with no solid income is rejected by a wealthy industrialist when he dares to ask for his daughter's hand. After 20 yeas he has become a wealthy financier in America; he returns to his homeland and starts to track down the girl of his dreams.

A taxi driver finds a baby in his cab after the mother accidentally leaves him behind.

A comedy about an unemployed fellow who goes to live with his brother and runs into trouble with his brother's overbearing wife.

A comedy about a governor who wants a miller's wife and tries to fix a night with her by putting the miller in jail.