AIDS doctor Antonia's husband is killed by a car. She gets depressed until she learns he had been cheating on her with a man. Following her newly born curiosity for life, she goes to see ...
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Long-time friends: Davide, a successful novelist, lives with Lorenzo, who's everyone's favorite; Antonio and Angelique, married with two children; Neval, a voluble Turk, and her compliant ... See full summary »
Overburdened and stuck in a greying marriage, Giovanna takes to caring for the Jewish Holocaust survivor her husband brings home. As she begins to reflect on her life, she turns to the man who lives across from her ...
Director:
Ferzan Ozpetek
Stars:
Giovanna Mezzogiorno,
Massimo Girotti,
Raoul Bova
Tommaso is the youngest son of the Cantones, a large, traditional southern Italian family operating a pasta-making business since the 1960s. On a trip home from Rome, where he studies ... See full summary »
Francesco and Marta are husband and wife running a small design company in Rome. When Francesco's long forgotten Aunt Anita dies in Istanbul, he travels there to look after the sale of the ... See full summary »
Director:
Ferzan Ozpetek
Stars:
Alessandro Gassman,
Francesca d'Aloja,
Carlo Cecchi
Elena (Kasia Smutniak) and Antonio (Francesco Arca) seem not to be made for each other. They are too different in terms of character, life choices, worldview, and the way they relate to ... See full summary »
Director:
Ferzan Ozpetek
Stars:
Kasia Smutniak,
Francesco Arca,
Filippo Scicchitano
As the Ottoman Empire comes to an end, an old servant spins a tale to keep the women in the Sultan's harem distracted. The story is about Safiye, who first becomes the Sultan's favorite ... See full summary »
The only dream of Pietro is to become a famous actor. 28 year-old Pietro is so obsessed with becoming an actor that he does not mind trying every single way. He comes Rome and starts to ... See full summary »
Director:
Ferzan Ozpetek
Stars:
Elio Germano,
Margherita Buy,
Vittoria Puccini
In a Naples suspended between magic and superstition, madness and rationality, a mystery envelops the existence of Adriana, overwhelmed by a sudden love and a violent crime.
Director:
Ferzan Ozpetek
Stars:
Giovanna Mezzogiorno,
Alessandro Borghi,
Anna Bonaiuto
Carlo's life is thrown into a tailspin when his longtime girlfriend Giulia announces she's pregnant. As Carlo faces up to his anxieties about adulthood, his buddies Paolo, Adriano and ... See full summary »
Deniz, an acclaimed author, is writing a book about his family and friends. He asks Orhan for critics. The day Orhan came to Istanbul from London, Deniz disappears. Orhan, Deniz's friend Neval and Deniz's lover Yusuf tries to find Deniz.
Director:
Ferzan Ozpetek
Stars:
Halit Ergenç,
Tuba Büyüküstün,
Mehmet Günsür
AIDS doctor Antonia's husband is killed by a car. She gets depressed until she learns he had been cheating on her with a man. Following her newly born curiosity for life, she goes to see her husband's lover, Michele, and finds a huge apartment that he shares with gay and transgendered friends, including a Turkish immigrant and a prostitute. Antonia is reluctant to tell these people of her relationship to the dead man, but needs prompting to move on to a new phase of her life.Written by
Sujit R. Varma
Title Card:
[written on the back of the painting]
To Massimo, for our seven years together, for that part of you that I miss and I will never have, for every time you said I can't, but also for every time you said I'll be back... Always waiting, can I call my patience love? Your ignorant fairy
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Here is a film that is both unconventional and deeply touching.
The best thing about this film is the absence in it of any clichés. This holds, first of all, for the main gay character, Michele. In Italian films gay characters tend to be described in extremely stereotyped ways; in other films, such as "Philadelphia", there are gay characters that tend to be described as if they were sort of saints. In this case, instead, the main gay character is a complex man, with contrasting aspects; the tension between his love for someone he will never be able to fully share his love with and his inability to requite the affection of those who could; the tension between his attraction for the widow of his late lover, in whom he finds an echo of aspects he loved in him, and the hatred he feels for his rival; the bitterness for the love lost and the willingness to engage in fast sex; all makes this character a fascinating one.
Even more so for the main female character. For once Margherita Buy plays a different character from the neurotic, insecure women she has often played in the past, and is given a wonderful opportunity to show her dramatic skills. She's hurt and yet not bitter, she's open-minded and yet has a morality of her own, she's curious and yet not intrusive; she plays a thoughtful, sensitive, tender and deeply human character, for whom one can feel nothing but sympathy.
Many foreigners seem to especially like films which depict Italy and Italians in strongly conventional ways, such as "Mediterraneo", "Life is Beautiful" or "Cinema Paradiso": a rural country, populated by childish, superficial and sentimental people surrounded by beautiful landscapes, preferably in Tuscany, and artistic beauties. This film, set in a dilapidated district of Rome, will probably make them understand that Italy is a country quite different, in many ways, from the one they like to see represented in some Italian films.
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Here is a film that is both unconventional and deeply touching.
The best thing about this film is the absence in it of any clichés. This holds, first of all, for the main gay character, Michele. In Italian films gay characters tend to be described in extremely stereotyped ways; in other films, such as "Philadelphia", there are gay characters that tend to be described as if they were sort of saints. In this case, instead, the main gay character is a complex man, with contrasting aspects; the tension between his love for someone he will never be able to fully share his love with and his inability to requite the affection of those who could; the tension between his attraction for the widow of his late lover, in whom he finds an echo of aspects he loved in him, and the hatred he feels for his rival; the bitterness for the love lost and the willingness to engage in fast sex; all makes this character a fascinating one.
Even more so for the main female character. For once Margherita Buy plays a different character from the neurotic, insecure women she has often played in the past, and is given a wonderful opportunity to show her dramatic skills. She's hurt and yet not bitter, she's open-minded and yet has a morality of her own, she's curious and yet not intrusive; she plays a thoughtful, sensitive, tender and deeply human character, for whom one can feel nothing but sympathy.
Many foreigners seem to especially like films which depict Italy and Italians in strongly conventional ways, such as "Mediterraneo", "Life is Beautiful" or "Cinema Paradiso": a rural country, populated by childish, superficial and sentimental people surrounded by beautiful landscapes, preferably in Tuscany, and artistic beauties. This film, set in a dilapidated district of Rome, will probably make them understand that Italy is a country quite different, in many ways, from the one they like to see represented in some Italian films.