Seven Beauties (1975)

The defense of honor, a strong value in Neapolitan society, and his effects on the life of everyman Pasquale Frafuso.

Director:

Lina Wertmüller

Writer:

Lina Wertmüller

Stars:

Giancarlo Giannini, Fernando Rey, Shirley Stoler

Nominated for 4 Oscars. Another 2 wins & 5 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Giancarlo Giannini	...	Pasqualino Frafuso aka Settebellezze
Fernando Rey	...	Pedro the Anarchist Prisoner
Shirley Stoler	...	The Prison Camp Commandant
Elena Fiore	...	Concettina, a Sister
Piero Di Iorio	...	Francesco - Pasqualino's comrade
Enzo Vitale	...	Don Raffaele
Roberto Herlitzka	...	Socialist
Lucio Amelio	...	Lawyer
Ermelinda De Felice	...	Pasqualino's Mother
Bianca D'Origlia	...	The Psychiatrist
Francesca Marciano	...	Carolina (as Francesca Marciani)
Mario Conti	...	Totonno '18 Carati' - Concettina's pimp
Barbara Valmorin	...	The Prison Camp Commandant's Secretary
Emilio Salvatore
Aristide Caporale	...	Madman (as Aristide Caporali)

Storyline

Pasqualino, an Italian everyman, deserts the army during World War II. Germans capture him and send him to a prison camp, where he does just about anything to survive. In lengthy flashbacks, we see him and his family of seven unattractive sisters (the seven beauties), his accidental murder of one sister's lover, his confession and imprisonment, his calculated switch to an asylum, his rape of a patient, and his volunteering to be a soldier to escape confinement. To the chagrin of his obese German captor, his weak and cowardly character enables him to survive the war and return to Naples where he has a plan to survive the next world catastrophe.

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Plot Keywords:

starvation | title directed by female | kapo | murder trial | insane asylum | 

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Taglines:

...that's what they call him.

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Genres:

Comedy | Drama | War

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

Italy

Language:

Italian German Neapolitan Spanish

Release Date:

21 January 1976 (USA)

Also Known As:

Seven Beauties

Filming Locations:

Naples, Campania, Italy

Box Office

Opening Weekend USA:

$1,536, 16 April 2017

Gross USA:

$12,408

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$12,408

Company Credits

Production Co:

Medusa Distribuzione

Technical Specs

Runtime:

116 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

With this film, Lina Wertmüller became the first woman ever nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director. The only other women to be so nominated are Jane Campion for The Piano (1993), Sofia Coppola for Lost in Translation (2003), Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker (2008), and Greta Gerwig for Lady Bird (2017). Bigelow is the only one of the five to have won the award.

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Quotes

Narrator: The ones who don't enjoy themselves, even when they laugh. Oh yeah. The ones who worship the corporate image, not knowing that they work for someone else. Oh yeah. The ones who should have been shot in the cradle... Pow! Oh yeah. The ones who say 'Follow me to success, but kill me if I fail... so to speak.' Oh yeah. The ones who say we Italians are the greatest he-men on earth. Oh yeah. The ones who are noble Romans, the ones who say 'That's for me,' the ones who say 'You know what I mean.' Oh ...

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Alternate Versions

In the United States the film was shown in both a subtitled and English-dubbed versions.

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Connections

Referenced in I Am Self Sufficient (1976)

User Reviews

A wild, bleak extravaganza

A wild, bleak extravaganza in which our Everyman learns to shed everything--even the honor that was the one thing he had--for survival. There's a near-perfect use of images--for example, the use of bright flowered dresses to signify that yet another sister has become a whore--and an equally perfect use of sound, silence, and music. A very, very dark comedy that is largely summed up in the opening sequence, a long litany of those who are to blame. I quote only a few lines: "the ones who don't enjoy themselves even when they laugh. . . the ones who should have been shot in the cradle (pow!). . . the ones who have never had a fatal accident.. . the ones who have had one. . ."

Avoid the dubbed version; it's terrible.