Luigi Pirandello was an Italian dramatist, novelist, poet, and short story writer whose greatest contributions were his plays. He was awarded the 1934 Nobel Prize in Literature "for his bold and ingenious revival of dramatic and scenic art". Pirandello's works include novels, hundreds of short stories, and about 40 plays, some of which are written in Sicilian. Pirandello's tragic farces are often seen as forerunners of the Theatre of the Absurd.
Vittorio De Sica was an Italian film director and actor, a leading figure in the neorealist movement.
Massimo Troisi was an Italian actor, cabaret performer, comedian, screenwriter and film director. He is best known for his works in the films I'm Starting back from Three (1981) and Il Postino: The Postman (1994), for which he was posthumously nominated for two Oscars. Nicknamed "the comedian of feelings", he is considered one of the most important actors of Italian theater and cinema.
Two Women is a 1960 war drama film directed by Vittorio De Sica from a screenplay he co-wrote with Cesare Zavattini, based on the 1957 novel of the same name by Alberto Moravia. The film stars Sophia Loren, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Eleonora Brown and Raf Vallone. It tells the story of a woman trying to protect her young daughter from the horrors of war. The story is fictional but based on actual events of 1944 in Rome and rural Lazio, during the Marocchinate.
Enrique of Malacca, was a Malay member of the Magellan expedition that completed the first circumnavigation of the world in 1519–1522. He was acquired as a slave by the Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan in 1511 at the age of 14 years, probably in the early stages of the capture of Malacca. Magellan's will calls him "a native of Malacca", while Antonio Pigafetta states that he was a native of Sumatra. Magellan took him to Europe, and in 1519 he was brought along on the famous circumnavigation expedition. According to some historians, it is possible that he could be the first person to circumnavigate the globe and return to his starting point, however, there is no record or source that confirms it.
Stoyanka Savova Nikolova, best known by her stage name Elena Nicolai, was a Bulgarian operatic mezzo-soprano.
My Voyage to Italy is a personal documentary by acclaimed Italian-American director Martin Scorsese. The film is a voyage through Italian cinema history, marking influential films for Scorsese and particularly covering the Italian neorealism period.
Gabriele Ferzetti was an Italian actor with more than 160 credits across film, television, and stage. His career was at its peak in the 1950s and 1960s.
Blood for Dracula is a 1974 horror film written and directed by Paul Morrissey, and starring Udo Kier, Joe Dallesandro, Maxime McKendry, Stefania Casini, Arno Juerging and Vittorio de Sica. Upon its initial 1974 release in West Germany and the United States, Blood for Dracula was released as Andy Warhol's Dracula.
Massimo Ranieri is an Italian singer, actor, television presenter and theatre director.
Enrico Maria Salerno was an Italian actor, voice actor and film director. He was also the voice of Clint Eastwood in the Italian version of Sergio Leone's Dollars Trilogy films, and the voice of Christ in The Gospel According to St. Matthew directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini.
Teresa Venerdì is a 1941 Italian "white-telephones" comedy film directed by Vittorio De Sica. It is a remake of the Hungarian film Rézi Friday.
Adriana Asti is an Italian stage, film, and voice actress.
Il bell'Antonio is a 1960 Italian-French drama film directed by Mauro Bolognini and starring Marcello Mastroianni and Claudia Cardinale. It is based on the novel of the same name by Vitaliano Brancati and was adapted for the screen by Pier Paolo Pasolini and Gino Visentini, moving the novel's setting during Italy's fascist era to the present.
Doctor and the Healer is a 1957 Italian comedy film directed by Mario Monicelli.
In Olden Days is a 1952 Italian comedy drama anthology film directed by Alessandro Blasetti and featuring an ensemble cast that included Gina Lollobrigida, Amedeo Nazzari, Vittorio De Sica, Elisa Cegani, Barbara Florian, Aldo Fabrizi, Andrea Checchi and Alba Arnova. It was shot at the Cinecittà Studios in Rome. The film's sets were designed by the art directors Dario Cecchi and Veniero Colasanti. It is also known as Times Gone By and Infidelity.
Lucrezia Lante della Rovere is an Italian film, television and theatre actress, who made her debut in Mario Monicelli's Speriamo che sia femmina (1986), where she acted along with Catherine Deneuve, Stefania Sandrelli, Giuliana De Sio, Giuliano Gemma, Bernard Blier, Philippe Noiret and Paolo Hendel.
Ennio Guarnieri was an Italian cinematographer.
The list of the A hundred Italian films to be saved was created with the aim to report "100 films that have changed the collective memory of the country between 1942 and 1978". Film preservation, or film restoration, describes a series of ongoing efforts among film historians, archivists, museums, cinematheques, and non-profit organizations to rescue decaying film stock and preserve the images they contain. In the widest sense, preservation assures that a movie will continue to exist in as close to its original form as possible.
The Voyage is a 1921 Italian silent drama film directed by Gennaro Righelli and starring Maria Jacobini and Carlo Benetti. It is an adaptation of the novel of the same title by Luigi Pirandello. It was made by the Turin-based Fert Film.
