Paisan(1946)

La Terra Trema(it)

In rural Sicily, the fishermen live at the mercy of the greedy wholesalers. One family risks everything to buy their own boat and operate independently.

Germany, Year Zero(it)

In the ruins of post-WWII Berlin, a twelve-year-old boy is left to his own devices in order to help provide for his family.

The Conspirators(it)

Rome, 1825. Bishop Rivarola and Colonel Nardoni are in charge of suppressing the liberal revolution. Shoemaker Cornacchia got the information that the liberal Filippo Spada is a spy and is going to denounce his revolutionary companions.

The Crime of Monsieur Lange(fr)

A man and a woman arrive in a cafe-hotel near the Belgian frontier. The customers recognize the man from the police's description: his name is Amedee Lange, and he murdered somebody in Paris. Lange was an employee in a printing works. His boss was a real bastard, swindling every one, seducing female workers... One day he fled to avoid facing his creditors, and the workers set up a cooperative to go on working. What then made Lange a killer?

The Hands of Orlac(de)

A world-famous pianist loses both hands in an accident. When new hands are grafted on, he is horrified to learn they once belonged to a murderer.

It Happened at the Police Station(it)

Everyday all kind of people pass through a Police Station, especially if it is downtown. Today, however, the chief of police has bought his first car and he has decided to test it with his wife going to Ostia. But first a theatrical company sent out of the theatre, last Alfredo Todini arrested while walking wearing a gown and in the mean a series of human cases, ranging from the pathetic to the funny one, get in the way of his wish.

Rabbit of Seville(en)

Behind the Hollywood Bowl stage which is playing the opera The Barber of Seville, Bugs Bunny flees into the backstage area with Elmer Fudd in close pursuit. Seeing his opportunity to fight on his terms, Bugs raises the curtain on Elmer, trapping him on stage. As the orchestra begins playing, Bugs comes into play as the barber who is going to make sure that Elmer is going to get a grooming he will never forget.

Journey to Italy(it)

This deceptively simple tale of a bored English couple travelling to Italy to find a buyer for a house inherited from an uncle is transformed by Roberto Rossellini into a passionate story of cruelty and cynicism as their marriage disintegrates around them.

The Match(it)

One football match on a dirt pitch near Rome becomes a day of reckoning as a young player, his coach and their team's owner wrestle internal demons.

And the Ship Sails On(it)

In 1914, a cruise ship sets sail from Naples to spread the ashes of beloved opera singer Edmea Tetua near Erimo, the isle of her birth. During the voyage, the eclectic array of passengers discovers a group of Serbian refugees aboard the vessel. Peace and camaraderie abound until the ship is descended upon by an Austrian flagship. The Serbians are forced to board it, but naturally they resist, igniting a skirmish that ends in destruction.

Straight Up(en)

Todd is a hyper-articulate, obsessive compulsive gay twentysomething whose fear of dying alone leads him to a baffling conclusion: he might not be gay after all. When he meets Rory, a whip-smart struggling actress with her own set of insecurities, the two forge a relationship that’s all talk and no sex.

Stromboli(it)

After the end of WWII, a young Lithuanian woman and a young Italian man from Stromboli impulsively marry, but married life on the island is more demanding than she can accept.

The Apparition(fr)

Jacques Mayano, a French journalist who has lived a traumatic experience, is recruited by the Vatican to be part of a task force that must investigate the veracity of a supernatural apparition allegedly happened in a small French village.

Shoeshine(it)

At a track near Rome, shoeshine boys are watching horses run. Two of the boys Pasquale, an orphan, and Giuseppe, his younger friend are riding. The pair have been saving to buy a horse of their own to ride...

Diary of a Country Priest(fr)

An inexperienced, sickly priest shows up in the rural French community of Ambricourt, where he joins the community's clergy. But the locals don't take kindly to the priest, and his ascetic ways and unsociable demeanor make him an outcast. During Bible studies at the nearby girls school, he is continually mocked by his students. Then his attempt to intervene in a family feud backfires into a scandal. His failures, compounded with his declining health, begin to erode his faith.

Letter from an Unknown Woman(en)

A pianist about to flee from a duel receives a letter from a woman he cannot remember. As she tells the story of her lifelong love for him, he is forced to reinterpret his own past.

Funeral Parade of Roses(ja)

In 1960s Tokyo, Gonda owns a bar in which the gay, cross-dresser, and trans scenes meet. Gonda is in a relationship with the madam of the bar, Leda. As the younger Eddie starts a passionate affair with Gonda, she ignites the jealousy of Leda, unaware of another kind of history between them.

Bellissima(it)

Film director Blasetti is looking for a little girl for his new movie. Along with other mothers, Maddelena takes her daughter to Cinecittà, hoping she’ll be selected and become a star. She is ready to sacrifice anything for little Maria.

Viridiana(es)

Viridiana is preparing to start her life as a nun when she is sent, somewhat unwillingly, to visit her aging uncle, Don Jaime. He supports her; but the two have met only once. Jaime thinks Viridiana resembles his dead wife. Viridiana has secretly despised this man all her life and finds her worst fears proven when Jaime grows determined to seduce his pure niece. Viridiana becomes undone as her uncle upends the plans she had made to join the convent.

A Man Escaped(fr)

A captured French Resistance fighter during World War II engineers a daunting escape from prison.

Salvatore Giuliano(it)

Sicilian bandit Salvatore Giuliano's bullet-riddled corpse is found facedown in a courtyard in Castelvetrano, a handgun and rifle by his side. Local and international press descend upon the scene, hoping to crack open the true story behind the death of this young man, who, at the age of twenty-seven, had already become Italy’s most wanted criminal and celebrated hero.

The Postman(it)

Simple Italian postman learns to love poetry while delivering mail to a famous poet; he uses this to woo local beauty Beatrice.

Roma(it)

A virtually plotless, gaudy, impressionistic portrait of Rome through the eyes of one of its most famous citizens.

The Knock Out Cop(it)

Inspector “Flatfoot” Rizzo investigates crime and corruption in Naples.

A Room with a View(en)

Lucy Honeychurch and her nervous chaperone embark on a grand tour of Italy. Alongside sweeping landscapes, Lucy encounters a suspect group of characters — socialist Mr. Emerson and his working-class son George, in particular — who both surprise and intrigue her. When piqued interest turns to potential romance, Lucy is whisked home to England, where her attention turns to Cecil Vyse. But now, with a well-developed appetite for adventure, will Lucy make the daring choice when it comes to love?

The Leopard(it)

As Garibaldi's troops begin the unification of Italy in the 1860s, an aristocratic Sicilian family grudgingly adapts to the sweeping social changes undermining their way of life. Proud but pragmatic Prince Don Fabrizio Salina allows his war hero nephew, Tancredi, to marry Angelica, the beautiful daughter of gauche, bourgeois Don Calogero, in order to maintain the family's accustomed level of comfort and political clout.

The Discovery of Heaven(en)

Disappointed with humanity, God wants to revoke his contract with humanity and wants to take back the stone tablets containing the ten commandments. To this end an angel is sent out to affect the personal lives of three humans so an appropriate child may be conceived.

Roman Holiday(en)

Overwhelmed by her suffocating schedule, touring European princess Ann takes off for a night while in Rome. When a sedative she took from her doctor kicks in, however, she falls asleep on a park bench and is found by an American reporter, Joe Bradley, who takes her back to his apartment for safety. At work the next morning, Joe finds out Ann's regal identity and bets his editor he can get exclusive interview with her, but romance soon gets in the way.

Umberto D.(it)

When elderly pensioner Umberto Domenico Ferrari returns to his boarding house from a protest calling for a hike in old-age pensions, his landlady demands her 15,000-lire rent by the end of the month or he and his small dog will be turned out onto the street. Unable to get the money in time, Umberto fakes illness to get sent to a hospital, giving his beloved dog to the landlady's pregnant and abandoned maid for temporary safekeeping.

Cinema Paradiso(it)

A filmmaker recalls his childhood, when he fell in love with the movies at his village's theater and formed a deep friendship with the theater's projectionist.

A Room with a View(en)

When Lucy Honeychurch and chaperon Charlotte Bartlett find themselves in Florence with rooms without views, fellow guests Mr Emerson and son George step in to remedy the situation. Meeting the Emersons could change Lucy's life forever but, once back in England, how will her experiences in Tuscany affect her marriage plans?

Pater familias(en)

The Best of Youth(it)

After a fateful encounter in the summer of 1966, the lives of two brothers from a middle-class Roman family take different directions, intersecting with some of the most significant events of postwar Italian history in the following decades.

Quo Vadis(en)

After fierce Roman commander Marcus Vinicius becomes infatuated with beautiful Christian hostage Lygia, he begins to question the tyrannical leadership of the despotic emperor Nero.

Malena(it)

During WWII, a teenage boy discovering himself becomes love-stricken by Malèna, a sensual woman living in a small, narrow-minded Italian town.

Léolo(fr)

The story of an imaginative boy who pretends he is the child of a sperm-laden Sicilian tomato upon which his mother accidentally fell.

Domenica(it)

Police inspector Sciarra, struggling with an identity crisis, and Domenica, an orphan who would like to know about her mother, spend one day together along the streets of Naples. It's Sciarra's last day of work and he has to take Domenica to the morgue, to identify a man who might have raped her. To Domenica, Sciarra is a father she never had, to him she is the daughter he couldn't have.

Accattone(it)

A pimp with no other means to provide for himself finds his life spiralling out of control when his prostitute is sent to prison.

Titus(en)

Titus Andronicus returns from the wars and sees his sons and daughters taken from him, one by one. Shakespeare's goriest and earliest tragedy.

Tea with Mussolini(en)

In 1930s fascist Italy, adolescent Luca just lost his mother. His father, a callous businessman, sends him to be taken care of by British expatriate Mary Wallace. Mary and her cultured friends - including artist Arabella, young widow Elsa, and archaeologist Georgie - keep a watchful eye over the boy. But the women's cultivated lives take a dramatic turn when Allied forces declare war on Mussolini.