The Tiger and the Snow (2005)
"La tigre e la neve" (original title)

A love-struck Italian poet is stuck in Iraq at the onset of an American invasion.

Director:

Roberto Benigni

Writers:

Roberto Benigni, Vincenzo Cerami

Stars:

Roberto Benigni, Jean Reno, Nicoletta Braschi

4 wins & 7 nominations.

Cast

Credited cast:
Roberto Benigni	...	Attilio de Giovanni
Jean Reno	...	Fuad
Nicoletta Braschi	...	Vittoria
Tom Waits	...	Himself
Emilia Fox	...	Nancy Browning
Gianfranco Varetto	...	Avvocato Scuotilancia
Giuseppe Battiston	...	Ermanno
Lucia Poli	...	Signora Serao
Chiara Pirri	...	Emilia
Anna Pirri	...	Rosa
Andrea Renzi	...	Dottor Guazzelli
Abdelhafid Metalsi	...	Dottore Salman
Amid Farid	...	Al Giumeil
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Mohmed Hedi Bahri	...	Firas scarpe
Franco Barbero

Storyline

Love and injury in time of war. Attilio de Giovanni teaches poetry in Italy. He has a romantic soul, and women love him. But he is in love with Vittoria, and the love is unrequited. Every night he dreams of marrying her, in his boxer shorts and t-shirt, as Tom Waits sings. Vittoria travels to Iraq with her friend, Fuad, a poet; they are there with the second Gulf War breaks out. Vittoria is injured. Attilio must get to her side, and then, as war rages around him, he must find her the medical care she needs. In war, does love conquer all?

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Plot Keywords:

iraq | poet | dream | concert | tiger | 

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Genres:

Comedy | Drama | Romance | War

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Details

Official Sites:

Pathé [fr]

Country:

Italy

Language:

Italian English Arabic French

Release Date:

14 October 2005 (Italy)

Also Known As:

The Tiger and the Snow

Filming Locations:

Naples, Campania, Italy

Box Office

Budget:

$35,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

$5,025 (USA) (29 December 2006)

Gross:

$9,047 (USA) (5 January 2007)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Melampo Cinematografica

Technical Specs

Runtime:

114 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Roberto Benigni named his character "Attilio" as a tribute to poet Attilio Bertolucci (1911-2000) father of famous directors Giuseppe and Bernardo Bertolucci.

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Quotes

Attilio de Giovanni: [in broken English] Tell him to stay calm! He's very nervous... he's going to shoot me; he's shaking! Stay calm! Molto calmo! Stay calm, I am having heart attack!
[breathes heavy]

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Connections

Features The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)

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Soundtracks

"You Can Never Hold Back Spring"
Written by Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan
Performed by Tom Waits

User Reviews

Another Benigni classic

Anyone who calls this film superficial, banal or trivial has spectacularly missed the point and is exactly the same type of person who was levelling precisely the same kind of criticism at La Vita è Bella. Now, though I do like Benigni (in my opinion La Vita è Bella is a masterpiece and films like Il Piccolo Diavolo, Johnny Stecchino and Il Mostro are exceedingly worthy comedies - that said I thought Pinocchio was an expensive disaster), I will try to be as objective as possible. In La Tigre e la Neve, Benigni repeats the masterfully delicate feat he accomplished in La Vita è Bella: he touches on complex, spikey issues (in La Vita è Bella it was the holocaust, here we have the war in Iraq) in a fable-like, simple manner - he doesn't politicise the film, and he doesn't delight in the gruesome (and very real) aspects of war. Yet this is NOT trivialisation of the subject matter. To believe that is to believe that the true horrors of war (or the holocaust) can only be conveyed on the screen by a documentary-style approach, and that cannot be the case. Benigni is far more effective - he does not shock the audience with visual representations of war, but his comedy in the face of war creates a subtle paradox that makes the whole film even more touching. La Tigre e La Neve is a fable about love, love in the face of adversity, stubborn optimism, hope and desperation and relationships between people of different races and creeds. Don't expect to see a Michael Moore rant at the injustice of war - Benigni is far more subtle. Perhaps the only criticism I have is that Nicoletta Braschi's performance is not always one hundred percent convincing, but Benigni and Reno more than make up for it. I truly hope it makes it on an international level - definitely a film to watch.