Sophia Loren is recovering after having a bad fall at her home in Switzerland.
The actress, 89, suffered several fractures, including to her femur and hip, after she fell in her bathroom at home on Sunday, a rep told People.
The rep insisted they were “optimistic” about Loren’s recovery following her surgery.
Loren’s restaurant chain also shared the news on their Instagram profile, writing in the translated message: “A fall at her home in Geneva today caused Ms Loren hip fractures.
“Operated with a positive outcome, he will now have to observe a short period of recovery and follow a road to rehabilitation. Thankfully everything worked out for the best and the Lady will be back with us very soon.
“The whole team at Sophia Loren Restaurant takes this opportunity to wish her a speedy recovery. #sophialoren @sophialorenrestaurant,” the post concluded.
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The actress, 89, suffered several fractures, including to her femur and hip, after she fell in her bathroom at home on Sunday, a rep told People.
The rep insisted they were “optimistic” about Loren’s recovery following her surgery.
Loren’s restaurant chain also shared the news on their Instagram profile, writing in the translated message: “A fall at her home in Geneva today caused Ms Loren hip fractures.
“Operated with a positive outcome, he will now have to observe a short period of recovery and follow a road to rehabilitation. Thankfully everything worked out for the best and the Lady will be back with us very soon.
“The whole team at Sophia Loren Restaurant takes this opportunity to wish her a speedy recovery. #sophialoren @sophialorenrestaurant,” the post concluded.
View this post on Instagram
A post shared...
- 9/25/2023
- by Becca Longmire
- ET Canada
Sophia Loren is recovering from emergency surgery for a fractured hip following a fall on Sunday in her home in Geneva, Switzerland.
Italy’s most famous living movie star, who turned 89 on Sept. 20, suffered several fractures after accidentally falling at home on Sunday morning, according to multiple reports. On Sunday afternoon, “Sophia was operated with positive outcome and will now have to undergo a brief period of convalescence followed by a complete rehabilitation,” said Italian national news agency Ansa.
She sustained “serious fractures” to different parts of her hip and femur, according to her agent Andrea Giusti who confirmed that both Loren’s sons, Carlo and Edoardo Ponti, were at her bedside. “The surgery went perfectly and we only need to wait,” Giusti told Variety in an email.
News of Loren’s hospitalization was first announced by a restaurant bearing her name that she was set to inaugurate on Tuesday...
Italy’s most famous living movie star, who turned 89 on Sept. 20, suffered several fractures after accidentally falling at home on Sunday morning, according to multiple reports. On Sunday afternoon, “Sophia was operated with positive outcome and will now have to undergo a brief period of convalescence followed by a complete rehabilitation,” said Italian national news agency Ansa.
She sustained “serious fractures” to different parts of her hip and femur, according to her agent Andrea Giusti who confirmed that both Loren’s sons, Carlo and Edoardo Ponti, were at her bedside. “The surgery went perfectly and we only need to wait,” Giusti told Variety in an email.
News of Loren’s hospitalization was first announced by a restaurant bearing her name that she was set to inaugurate on Tuesday...
- 9/25/2023
- by Nick Vivarelli
- Variety Film + TV
To celebrate the release of Mark Cousins’ new documentary The Storms of Jeremy Thomas, a portrait of the Oscar-winning producer responsible for bringing to life films by David Cronenberg, Jonathan Glazer, Jim Jarmusch, Bernardo Bertolucci, Nagisa Ôshima, Jerzy Skolimowski, and many more, NYC’s Quad Cinema is fittingly paying tribute to his career with a fantastic retrospective.
“Jeremy Thomas Presents” kicks off today and runs through September 28 at Quad Cinema, with The Storms of Jeremy Thomas opening this Friday, September 22. As the retrospective commences, we’re pleased to exclusively share the trailer along with comments directly from Thomas looking back at the making of these iconic films.
Sexy Beast
I was sent a script with a Jonathan Glazer attached, called “Sexy Beast”. It was on a Friday night, and I read it over the weekend. The screenplay was brilliant, and on the Monday I bought it before anyone else could.
“Jeremy Thomas Presents” kicks off today and runs through September 28 at Quad Cinema, with The Storms of Jeremy Thomas opening this Friday, September 22. As the retrospective commences, we’re pleased to exclusively share the trailer along with comments directly from Thomas looking back at the making of these iconic films.
Sexy Beast
I was sent a script with a Jonathan Glazer attached, called “Sexy Beast”. It was on a Friday night, and I read it over the weekend. The screenplay was brilliant, and on the Monday I bought it before anyone else could.
- 9/18/2023
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
When first-time documentary director Leonard Manzella premieres his award-winning “Shoe Shine Caddie” at the Portobello Film Festival in London on September 16, it will represent a kind of return to the former actor’s roots in the international film scene.
A professional family therapist for the past 30 years in California, Manzella’s earlier career began when the native Angeleno left Los Angeles for Rome in 1968 “when everything was burning.” In his early 20s and armed with “no contacts and about $50 bucks in my pocket,” a fortuitous introduction to American actor Brett Halsey got Manzella into movies, first as an extra and eventually as a leading man.
Halsey, who landed in Rome in the ‘60s and worked steadily in Euro crime thrillers and in the burgeoning spaghetti western scene, often toiled under the moniker Montgomery Ford and Leonard Manzella became famous as Leonard Mann.
“I went to Rome to study political science,...
A professional family therapist for the past 30 years in California, Manzella’s earlier career began when the native Angeleno left Los Angeles for Rome in 1968 “when everything was burning.” In his early 20s and armed with “no contacts and about $50 bucks in my pocket,” a fortuitous introduction to American actor Brett Halsey got Manzella into movies, first as an extra and eventually as a leading man.
Halsey, who landed in Rome in the ‘60s and worked steadily in Euro crime thrillers and in the burgeoning spaghetti western scene, often toiled under the moniker Montgomery Ford and Leonard Manzella became famous as Leonard Mann.
“I went to Rome to study political science,...
- 9/15/2023
- by Steven Gaydos
- Variety Film + TV
Though she rose to fame thanks largely to her looks, Italian superstar Sophia Loren more than proved her acting chops with a series of international hits and an Oscar win for Best Actress. But how many of her titles remain classics? Let’s take a look back at 15 of her greatest films, ranked worst to best.
Born in 1934 in Rome, Loren began appearing in films both in her native Italy and in Hollywood, popping up in several titles that played more to her incredible beauty than her acting chops. That all changed with “Two Women” (1961), a stirring drama from Italian neorealist Vittoria De Sica that cast her as a mother protecting her daughter from the horrors of World War II. The role brought her international acclaim and Oscar, BAFTA and Cannes Film Festival victories as Best Actress, making her the first performer in a foreign language film to win at the Academy.
Born in 1934 in Rome, Loren began appearing in films both in her native Italy and in Hollywood, popping up in several titles that played more to her incredible beauty than her acting chops. That all changed with “Two Women” (1961), a stirring drama from Italian neorealist Vittoria De Sica that cast her as a mother protecting her daughter from the horrors of World War II. The role brought her international acclaim and Oscar, BAFTA and Cannes Film Festival victories as Best Actress, making her the first performer in a foreign language film to win at the Academy.
- 9/14/2023
- by Zach Laws and Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
My favorite tracking shot in film history is not a tracking shot. It's a shot of a tracking shot.
The scene in question opens Jean Luc-Godard's "Contempt," and, visually, consists of little more than a movie camera gliding down a dolly track toward a stationary camera, which serves as the audience's Pov. As the camera moves closer into view, we see that it is shooting, at a 90-degree angle square to our perspective, a young woman (Giorgia Moll) scribbling notations in a book. Eventually, the camera rolls to a stop directly in front of our camera, which is now a low-angle shot of the film's cinematographer, Raoul Coutard, who pans his implement 90-degrees before pointing it downward at the audience. The effect is at once startling and amusing. We have, in essence, locked eyes with the filmmaker.
This may not sound terribly thrilling in writing, but factor in a...
The scene in question opens Jean Luc-Godard's "Contempt," and, visually, consists of little more than a movie camera gliding down a dolly track toward a stationary camera, which serves as the audience's Pov. As the camera moves closer into view, we see that it is shooting, at a 90-degree angle square to our perspective, a young woman (Giorgia Moll) scribbling notations in a book. Eventually, the camera rolls to a stop directly in front of our camera, which is now a low-angle shot of the film's cinematographer, Raoul Coutard, who pans his implement 90-degrees before pointing it downward at the audience. The effect is at once startling and amusing. We have, in essence, locked eyes with the filmmaker.
This may not sound terribly thrilling in writing, but factor in a...
- 9/14/2022
- by Jeremy Smith
- Slash Film
During the casting of "The Godfather," Paramount executives did not agree with director Francis Ford Coppola's choice of Marlon Brando for the iron-willed Vito Corleone. After a string of box office failures, on-set conflicts, and personal issues, they saw him as a temperamental has-been and prima donna. In his autobiography "Songs My Mother Taught Me," Brando admits even he thought he wasn't right for the part:
"I had never played an Italian before, and I didn't think I could do it successfully. They had to be convinced that he, not someone like Ernest Borgnine or Carlo Ponti, was perfect for the role."
But Brando proved he was the ideal choice, giving a hypnotic performance of sheer intensity and measured wisdom that went on to become his most iconic and earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor (though he famously declined the trophy and sent indigenous American rights activist...
"I had never played an Italian before, and I didn't think I could do it successfully. They had to be convinced that he, not someone like Ernest Borgnine or Carlo Ponti, was perfect for the role."
But Brando proved he was the ideal choice, giving a hypnotic performance of sheer intensity and measured wisdom that went on to become his most iconic and earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor (though he famously declined the trophy and sent indigenous American rights activist...
- 9/9/2022
- by Caroline Madden
- Slash Film
The king and queen of Italian cinema, Marcello Mastroianni and Sophia Loren, star in this story of a sexy older woman’s affair with a middle-aged gay man—it sounds like one of the duo’s naughty farces from the early ’60s but Ettore Scola’s film is a tragedy set during Mussolini’s regime. Produced by Loren’s husband Carlo Ponti, the film won the César Award for Best Foreign Film and garnered two Oscar nominations.
The post A Special Day appeared first on Trailers From Hell.
The post A Special Day appeared first on Trailers From Hell.
- 6/29/2022
- by Charlie Largent
- Trailers from Hell
It’s a pleasant thing to revisit an old favorite and discover that it’s better than you remember. The tale of Zampanò and Gelsomina is Italo neo-realism 2.0: it’s got poverty, misfortune and misery but also a bankable American star or two. The visually revamped presentation of Federico Fellini’s international breakthrough picture is a wonder — no more distorted audio and images that look as if they were filmed yesterday. Several of the extras are new, but the main charm is still provided by Giulietta Masina, Anthony Quinn and the Nino Rota music.
La Strada
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 219
1954 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 98 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date November 2, 2021 / 39.95
Starring: Anthony Quinn, Giulietta Masina, Richard Basehart, Aldo Silvani, Marcella Rovena, Livia Venturini.
Cinematography: Otello Martelli, Anna Primula.
Production Designer: Mario Ravasco
Art Direction: E. Cervelli, Brunello Rondi
Film Editor: Leo Cattozzo
Original Music: Nino Rota
Written by ederico Fellini,...
La Strada
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 219
1954 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 98 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date November 2, 2021 / 39.95
Starring: Anthony Quinn, Giulietta Masina, Richard Basehart, Aldo Silvani, Marcella Rovena, Livia Venturini.
Cinematography: Otello Martelli, Anna Primula.
Production Designer: Mario Ravasco
Art Direction: E. Cervelli, Brunello Rondi
Film Editor: Leo Cattozzo
Original Music: Nino Rota
Written by ederico Fellini,...
- 11/6/2021
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Watching both versions of this 1964 drama of Elephant Man-style exploitation reveals an impressive degree of tenderness and complexity
Marco Ferreri’s 1964 movie La Donna Scimmia (The Ape Woman) is a bizarre satire whose effect depends on keeping you unsure how bizarre and how satirical it is supposed to be. This is due to the vivid streak of sentimental tragicomedy that runs through the film – in fact, through both versions of the film that were made, and that now have now been included on the Blu-ray and digital versions of this release. Producer Carlo Ponti persuaded the director to create a “happy ending” version so the film could be entered for the Cannes film festival, and there is the original version Ferreri shot with its much darker ending. But you have to watch both; this dual narrative gives the film a new tenderness and complexity.
The Ape Woman is inspired...
Marco Ferreri’s 1964 movie La Donna Scimmia (The Ape Woman) is a bizarre satire whose effect depends on keeping you unsure how bizarre and how satirical it is supposed to be. This is due to the vivid streak of sentimental tragicomedy that runs through the film – in fact, through both versions of the film that were made, and that now have now been included on the Blu-ray and digital versions of this release. Producer Carlo Ponti persuaded the director to create a “happy ending” version so the film could be entered for the Cannes film festival, and there is the original version Ferreri shot with its much darker ending. But you have to watch both; this dual narrative gives the film a new tenderness and complexity.
The Ape Woman is inspired...
- 10/7/2021
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
I was born in 1934, raised by a single mother who had my sister and me out of wedlock.
My father was nowhere to be found. We lived in a tiny house with my grandmother, mother, and uncles. Growing up in war-torn Italy, it wasn’t so much the bombings, the hunger or the general sense of chaos that truly upset my sister and me, we were just children after all. It was the jeers from the other kids at school, the disapproving looks from the adults in the street; we were laughed at, bullied and shunned because my mother was not married.
Our mother was called every name under the sun and “whore” was the tamest one. At home, my sister and I could not understand the hatred, but my mother taught us to be strong, to be proud, to rise up from this prejudice and to build an identity...
My father was nowhere to be found. We lived in a tiny house with my grandmother, mother, and uncles. Growing up in war-torn Italy, it wasn’t so much the bombings, the hunger or the general sense of chaos that truly upset my sister and me, we were just children after all. It was the jeers from the other kids at school, the disapproving looks from the adults in the street; we were laughed at, bullied and shunned because my mother was not married.
Our mother was called every name under the sun and “whore” was the tamest one. At home, my sister and I could not understand the hatred, but my mother taught us to be strong, to be proud, to rise up from this prejudice and to build an identity...
- 3/8/2021
- by Sophia Loren
- Variety Film + TV
It has been 11 years since Sophia Loren, the great Italian star and one of the only surviving icons of Hollywood’s Golden Age, last graced the screen. And longer still since she last took a leading role. After her Oscar-winning heyday in the ’50s and ’60s, Loren turned to the only passion that could match her love for cinema—motherhood—and focused her attention on raising first her two sons, Carlo, a classical music conductor, and Edoardo Ponti, a filmmaker, and then her grandchildren. The actress, whose co-stars have included Cary Grant, Clark Cable and Marcello Mastroianni, to name only a few, had never retired, and her love for performance never dimmed; simply, her priorities changed.
It took her son, Edoardo, to coax her back to the screen this season for The Life Ahead, a new adaptation of Romain Gary’s The Life Before Us, and toward a performance that...
It took her son, Edoardo, to coax her back to the screen this season for The Life Ahead, a new adaptation of Romain Gary’s The Life Before Us, and toward a performance that...
- 1/15/2021
- by Joe Utichi
- Deadline Film + TV
John Huston directed his father Walter to an Oscar in 1948 for “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre” and his daughter Anjelica to one in 1985 for “Prizzi’s Honor.” Edoardo Ponti, 47, could well do the same for his mother, Sophia Loren, who shines in the acclaimed new Netflix drama “The Life Ahead.”
Ponti, the youngest of Loren’s two sons with her late husband, producer Carlo Ponti, is a graduate for USC School of Cinematic Arts and worked as an assistant with such directors as Michelangelo Antonioni and Robert Altman. He first directed his mother in his 2002 debut “Between Strangers.” Loren won the David di Donatello Award for their 2014 collaboration on “The Human Voice” based Jean Cocteau’s 1930 one-act play “The Human Voice.”
For “The Life Ahead,” Ponti and Ugo Chiti adapted Romain Gary’s 1975 novel “The Life Before Us,” which was also the source of the Oscar-winning 1977 French drama “Madame Rosa,...
Ponti, the youngest of Loren’s two sons with her late husband, producer Carlo Ponti, is a graduate for USC School of Cinematic Arts and worked as an assistant with such directors as Michelangelo Antonioni and Robert Altman. He first directed his mother in his 2002 debut “Between Strangers.” Loren won the David di Donatello Award for their 2014 collaboration on “The Human Voice” based Jean Cocteau’s 1930 one-act play “The Human Voice.”
For “The Life Ahead,” Ponti and Ugo Chiti adapted Romain Gary’s 1975 novel “The Life Before Us,” which was also the source of the Oscar-winning 1977 French drama “Madame Rosa,...
- 11/24/2020
- by Susan King
- Gold Derby
No, it’s not the story of the 18th President of the United States. Kirk Douglas must have been a big hit in Rome, starring in one of the first and best of the Italo epic ‘classics,’ before the musclemen cornered the market. Homer’s tale of the husband who took ten years to come back from Troy is given real star power, a splendid production and best of all, an intelligent script. This disc looks a lot better than the ragged earlier DVD, plus it offers a superior Italian language soundtrack. And don’t forget Gary Teetzel’s recommendation: as an adaptation of The Odyssey, it’s right up there with O Brother Where Art Thou!
Ulysses
Blu-ray
Kl Studio Classics
1954 / Color / 1:37 flat Academy / 94 104 117 min. / Street Date November 17, 2020 / Ulisse / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95
Starring: Kirk Douglas, Silvana Mangano, Anthony Quinn, Rossana Podestà, Jacques Dumesnil, Daniel Ivernel, Sylvie, Franco Interlenghi,...
Ulysses
Blu-ray
Kl Studio Classics
1954 / Color / 1:37 flat Academy / 94 104 117 min. / Street Date November 17, 2020 / Ulisse / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95
Starring: Kirk Douglas, Silvana Mangano, Anthony Quinn, Rossana Podestà, Jacques Dumesnil, Daniel Ivernel, Sylvie, Franco Interlenghi,...
- 11/21/2020
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Time has not diminished the beauty and talent of Sophia Loren, who is garnering Oscar buzz for her acclaimed performance in the Netflix drama “The Life Ahead,” directed and co-adapted by her son Edoardo Ponti from Romain Gary’s 1975 bestseller “The Life Before Us.” The 86-year-old Oscar-winner (“Two Women”) plays Madame Rosa, a former prostitute and Holocaust survivor who lives in Naples where she takes care of children of streetwalkers including the rebellious Momo.
Loren has been a star for over 65 years, but her early life was anything but idyllic. She was born in a charity ward in a hospital in Rome. Her parents never married, and her father left her, her mother and younger sister Romida-who married Mussolini’s son. Loren and her family grew up poor as church mice in Pozzuoli, a small town outside of Naples.
Stunningly beautiful at an early age and at 14, Loren came in...
Loren has been a star for over 65 years, but her early life was anything but idyllic. She was born in a charity ward in a hospital in Rome. Her parents never married, and her father left her, her mother and younger sister Romida-who married Mussolini’s son. Loren and her family grew up poor as church mice in Pozzuoli, a small town outside of Naples.
Stunningly beautiful at an early age and at 14, Loren came in...
- 11/20/2020
- by Susan King
- Gold Derby
What becomes a legend most?
Well, in the case of the Oscar-winning 86-year-old Sophia Loren, a terrific role in the new Netflix movie “The Life Ahead,” which premiered on Nov. 13 to rave reviews. The film is also a valentine from her youngest son Edoardo Ponti who co-adapted and directed the drama based on Romain Gary’s 1975 novel “The Life Before Us.”
Loren plays Madame Rosa, a former prostitute and Holocaust survivor living in Naples who now takes care of children of prostitutes. But she has her hands full with her latest charge, a 12-year-old Senegalese immigrant named Momo (Ibrahim Gueye). Rosa may seem like the ultimate earth foster mother, but she is haunted by fevered memories of her time at Auschwitz and more and more frequently drifts away from reality.
If the plotline of “The Life Ahead” sounds familiar, the Gary novel was originally adapted as “Madame Rosa,” an Oscar-winning...
Well, in the case of the Oscar-winning 86-year-old Sophia Loren, a terrific role in the new Netflix movie “The Life Ahead,” which premiered on Nov. 13 to rave reviews. The film is also a valentine from her youngest son Edoardo Ponti who co-adapted and directed the drama based on Romain Gary’s 1975 novel “The Life Before Us.”
Loren plays Madame Rosa, a former prostitute and Holocaust survivor living in Naples who now takes care of children of prostitutes. But she has her hands full with her latest charge, a 12-year-old Senegalese immigrant named Momo (Ibrahim Gueye). Rosa may seem like the ultimate earth foster mother, but she is haunted by fevered memories of her time at Auschwitz and more and more frequently drifts away from reality.
If the plotline of “The Life Ahead” sounds familiar, the Gary novel was originally adapted as “Madame Rosa,” an Oscar-winning...
- 11/17/2020
- by Susan King
- Gold Derby
You’d think Lorraine Bracco would have been to Italy by now, but it took a one-euro home — and HGTV — to get her there.
The 66-year-old star of “Goodfellas” and “The Sopranos” admits she gamed the system to land one of the 16 sought-after (and basically free) Sicily fixer-uppers, which was really more of a tourism advertisement than an earnest real estate opportunity.
“I’ll be truthful: I was very cheeky,” Bracco recalled of the email that got her selected into the program. “When I wrote to the mayor, I wrote that I was an Italian-American actress and I was really interested in getting one of the one euro [houses]. And I did mention that I could get HGTV to come with me and cover it.”
That’ll do it.
But her onscreen work is not what got Bracco the keys to what equates to a $1.30 home in Sambuca, Italy: Bracco told...
The 66-year-old star of “Goodfellas” and “The Sopranos” admits she gamed the system to land one of the 16 sought-after (and basically free) Sicily fixer-uppers, which was really more of a tourism advertisement than an earnest real estate opportunity.
“I’ll be truthful: I was very cheeky,” Bracco recalled of the email that got her selected into the program. “When I wrote to the mayor, I wrote that I was an Italian-American actress and I was really interested in getting one of the one euro [houses]. And I did mention that I could get HGTV to come with me and cover it.”
That’ll do it.
But her onscreen work is not what got Bracco the keys to what equates to a $1.30 home in Sambuca, Italy: Bracco told...
- 10/30/2020
- by Tony Maglio
- The Wrap
Eight months ago, Netflix scooped up “The Life Ahead,” Italian USC grad Edoardo Ponti’s third collaboration with his mother, two-time Oscar-winner Sophia Loren, returning to the screen at age 86 for the first time in almost a decade. It’s easy to see why the streamer wanted to buy the Italian movie. Like the 1977 foreign-language Oscar-winner “Madame Rosa” starring Simone Signoret, Ponti’s film is adapted from Romain Gary’s 1975 French novel “The Life Before Us.” He moved the setting from France in the ‘70s to a contemporary Italian seaside town, but the story is much the same.
Madame Rosa is a tough Auschwitz survivor and former prostitute who cares for the children of streetwalkers. Her doctor asks her to look after a sullen 12-year orphan Muslim who reluctantly returns her filched purse. At first, the Sudanese boy seems intractable, getting into fights with her other kids and selling drugs...
Madame Rosa is a tough Auschwitz survivor and former prostitute who cares for the children of streetwalkers. Her doctor asks her to look after a sullen 12-year orphan Muslim who reluctantly returns her filched purse. At first, the Sudanese boy seems intractable, getting into fights with her other kids and selling drugs...
- 10/26/2020
- by Anne Thompson
- Thompson on Hollywood
Eight months ago, Netflix scooped up “The Life Ahead,” Italian USC grad Edoardo Ponti’s third collaboration with his mother, two-time Oscar-winner Sophia Loren, returning to the screen at age 86 for the first time in almost a decade. It’s easy to see why the streamer wanted to buy the Italian movie. Like the 1977 foreign-language Oscar-winner “Madame Rosa” starring Simone Signoret, Ponti’s film is adapted from Romain Gary’s 1975 French novel “The Life Before Us.” He moved the setting from France in the ‘70s to a contemporary Italian seaside town, but the story is much the same.
Madame Rosa is a tough Auschwitz survivor and former prostitute who cares for the children of streetwalkers. Her doctor asks her to look after a sullen 12-year orphan Muslim who reluctantly returns her filched purse. At first, the Sudanese boy seems intractable, getting into fights with her other kids and selling drugs...
Madame Rosa is a tough Auschwitz survivor and former prostitute who cares for the children of streetwalkers. Her doctor asks her to look after a sullen 12-year orphan Muslim who reluctantly returns her filched purse. At first, the Sudanese boy seems intractable, getting into fights with her other kids and selling drugs...
- 10/26/2020
- by Anne Thompson
- Indiewire
Nearly 60 years ago, Sophia Loren starred as a mother trying to protect her daughter from the horrors of war in World War II Rome in 1961’s Two Women, a film produced by her late husband Carlo Ponti, and a role that would win her the Oscar for Best Actress. Now the legendary actress is returning to […]
The post ‘The Life Ahead’ Trailer: Sophia Loren Returns After a Decade-Long Acting Hiatus appeared first on /Film.
The post ‘The Life Ahead’ Trailer: Sophia Loren Returns After a Decade-Long Acting Hiatus appeared first on /Film.
- 10/25/2020
- by Hoai-Tran Bui
- Slash Film
In 1984, the Oscar-winning actress Sophia Loren (“Two Women”) and her then-11-year-old son Edoardo Ponti starred in the TV movie “Aurora.” That little-remembered film began a lovely collaboration between the legendary actress and Ponti, Loren’s younger son by her late husband, producer Carlo Ponti.
Edoardo Ponti gave up acting and switched to directing after earning a fine arts degree in 1998 from USC in film directing in production. And he directed Loren for the first time in the 2002 drama “Between Strangers.” Mother and son both earned acclaimed for their 2014 short, “The Human Voice,” based on Jean Cocteau’s one-act 1930 play.
Their latest collaboration-and Loren’s first film since “The Human Voice”- is the Italian drama “The Life Ahead,” a contemporary adaptation of Romain Gary’s 1975 best-seller “The Life Before Us.” The still-stunning 86-year-old Loren plays a Holocaust survivor named Madame Rosa who becomes unlikely friends with a rebellious 12-year-old...
Edoardo Ponti gave up acting and switched to directing after earning a fine arts degree in 1998 from USC in film directing in production. And he directed Loren for the first time in the 2002 drama “Between Strangers.” Mother and son both earned acclaimed for their 2014 short, “The Human Voice,” based on Jean Cocteau’s one-act 1930 play.
Their latest collaboration-and Loren’s first film since “The Human Voice”- is the Italian drama “The Life Ahead,” a contemporary adaptation of Romain Gary’s 1975 best-seller “The Life Before Us.” The still-stunning 86-year-old Loren plays a Holocaust survivor named Madame Rosa who becomes unlikely friends with a rebellious 12-year-old...
- 10/21/2020
- by Susan King
- Gold Derby
As theaters struggle and studios push release dates, Netflix is unruffled: The streamer never has been in the exhibition business beyond whatever’s necessary to promote and brand their films. But when it comes to awards campaigning, the brief theatrical run is a Netflix tradition.
The Netflix Oscar paradigm launched in 2018, the year “Roma” made its run for the 2019 Best Picture, collecting three statues for Alfonso Cuarón (losing the big prize to “Green Book”), and continued last year with 24 nominations, including 10 for Martin Scorsese’s “The Irishman” (it whiffed on Oscar night), and six for Noah Baumbach’s “Marriage Story” (Best Supporting Actress for Laura Dern) along with Best Documentary winner “American Factory.” Awards aside, the end goal is to convince filmmakers to bring their projects to Netflix.
Already playing on the site (as well as the Academy screening portal) are Spike Lee’s Best Picture contender “Da 5 Bloods,...
The Netflix Oscar paradigm launched in 2018, the year “Roma” made its run for the 2019 Best Picture, collecting three statues for Alfonso Cuarón (losing the big prize to “Green Book”), and continued last year with 24 nominations, including 10 for Martin Scorsese’s “The Irishman” (it whiffed on Oscar night), and six for Noah Baumbach’s “Marriage Story” (Best Supporting Actress for Laura Dern) along with Best Documentary winner “American Factory.” Awards aside, the end goal is to convince filmmakers to bring their projects to Netflix.
Already playing on the site (as well as the Academy screening portal) are Spike Lee’s Best Picture contender “Da 5 Bloods,...
- 10/9/2020
- by Anne Thompson
- Indiewire
As theaters struggle and studios push release dates, Netflix is unruffled: The streamer never has been in the exhibition business beyond whatever’s necessary to promote and brand their films. But when it comes to awards campaigning, the brief theatrical run is a Netflix tradition.
The Netflix Oscar paradigm launched in 2018, the year “Roma” made its run for the 2019 Best Picture, collecting three statues for Alfonso Cuarón (losing the big prize to “Green Book”), and continued last year with 24 nominations, including 10 for Martin Scorsese’s “The Irishman” (it whiffed on Oscar night), and six for Noah Baumbach’s “Marriage Story” (Best Supporting Actress for Laura Dern) along with Best Documentary winner “American Factory.” Awards aside, the end goal is to convince filmmakers to bring their projects to Netflix.
Already playing on the site (as well as the Academy screening portal) are Spike Lee’s Best Picture contender “Da 5 Bloods,...
The Netflix Oscar paradigm launched in 2018, the year “Roma” made its run for the 2019 Best Picture, collecting three statues for Alfonso Cuarón (losing the big prize to “Green Book”), and continued last year with 24 nominations, including 10 for Martin Scorsese’s “The Irishman” (it whiffed on Oscar night), and six for Noah Baumbach’s “Marriage Story” (Best Supporting Actress for Laura Dern) along with Best Documentary winner “American Factory.” Awards aside, the end goal is to convince filmmakers to bring their projects to Netflix.
Already playing on the site (as well as the Academy screening portal) are Spike Lee’s Best Picture contender “Da 5 Bloods,...
- 10/9/2020
- by Anne Thompson
- Thompson on Hollywood
Exclusive: Add Sophia Loren to the growing list of those whose names we are likely to hear come this Oscar awards season.
The legendary star and 1961 Best Actress Academy Award winner for Two Women, as well as the recipient of an Honorary Oscar in 1991 inscribed “for a career rich with memorable performances that has added permanent luster to our art form,” is returning to movies in The Life Ahead. She stars as Madame Rosa, a Jewish survivor of the Holocaust who now makes a meager living raising a number of children of prostitutes with whom she once walked the streets. Among those she takes in is Momo, a 12-year-old Senegalese orphan who steals her candlesticks. After he is forced to apologize, they form a relationship audiences around the world are not likely to soon forget when the previously undated film premieres worldwide on Netflix on November 13.
I would call this vintage Loren,...
The legendary star and 1961 Best Actress Academy Award winner for Two Women, as well as the recipient of an Honorary Oscar in 1991 inscribed “for a career rich with memorable performances that has added permanent luster to our art form,” is returning to movies in The Life Ahead. She stars as Madame Rosa, a Jewish survivor of the Holocaust who now makes a meager living raising a number of children of prostitutes with whom she once walked the streets. Among those she takes in is Momo, a 12-year-old Senegalese orphan who steals her candlesticks. After he is forced to apologize, they form a relationship audiences around the world are not likely to soon forget when the previously undated film premieres worldwide on Netflix on November 13.
I would call this vintage Loren,...
- 9/22/2020
- by Pete Hammond
- Deadline Film + TV
Juliano Dornelles on Michael in Bacurau: “When Udo Kier’s character said to the outsiders about the Brazilian collaborators, ‘They don’t speak Brazilian here.’ Brazilian, it’s not a name.”
In celebration of the theatrical release of Bacurau in New York, Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles will present Mapping Bacurau, a program of films that include John Sayles’s Lone Star,; Colin Eggleston’s Long Weekend; Paul Morrissey’s Blood For Dracula; 70mm print of John Carpenter’s Starman; Ted Kotcheff’s Wake In Fright, and a 4K restoration of Robin Hardy’s The Wicker Man: The Final Cut.
Kleber Mendonça Filho with Juliano Dornelles on Bacurau: “The horses for us is a very interesting marker that this is a Western. They’re beautiful animals, the way they move.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
Bacurau, shot by Pedro Sotero, edited by Eduardo Serrano, costumes by Rita Azevedo, with a.
In celebration of the theatrical release of Bacurau in New York, Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles will present Mapping Bacurau, a program of films that include John Sayles’s Lone Star,; Colin Eggleston’s Long Weekend; Paul Morrissey’s Blood For Dracula; 70mm print of John Carpenter’s Starman; Ted Kotcheff’s Wake In Fright, and a 4K restoration of Robin Hardy’s The Wicker Man: The Final Cut.
Kleber Mendonça Filho with Juliano Dornelles on Bacurau: “The horses for us is a very interesting marker that this is a Western. They’re beautiful animals, the way they move.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
Bacurau, shot by Pedro Sotero, edited by Eduardo Serrano, costumes by Rita Azevedo, with a.
- 2/23/2020
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
‘Mission impossible’ escapism about high-stakes wartime sabotage looks at an authentic, dramatic episode of WW2 — the onslaught of futuristic V-Weapons on London — and then veers into fictional fantasy (think big explosions). George Peppard toughs it out to get free of his MGM contract. Lili Palmer and Barbara Rütting do the heavy lifting, while Sophia Loren is in as a glamorous sidebar. Weirdly, the movie all but lionizes the Germans that develop, test and fire the V-Weapon rockets at England … exaggerating their scientific progress and giving them a strange kind of ‘Right Stuff.’
Operation Crossbow
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1965 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 116 min. / Street Date November 12, 2019 / available through the WBshop / 21.99
Starring: Sophia Loren, George Peppard, Trevor Howard, John Mills, Richard Johnson, Tom Courtenay, Jeremy Kemp, Anthony Quayle, Lilli Palmer, Barbara Rütting (Rueting), Paul Henreid, Helmut Dantine, Richard Todd, Sylvia Sims, John Fraser, Maurice Denham, Patrick Wymark, Richard Wattis, Allan Cuthbertson, Karel Stepanek,...
Operation Crossbow
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1965 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 116 min. / Street Date November 12, 2019 / available through the WBshop / 21.99
Starring: Sophia Loren, George Peppard, Trevor Howard, John Mills, Richard Johnson, Tom Courtenay, Jeremy Kemp, Anthony Quayle, Lilli Palmer, Barbara Rütting (Rueting), Paul Henreid, Helmut Dantine, Richard Todd, Sylvia Sims, John Fraser, Maurice Denham, Patrick Wymark, Richard Wattis, Allan Cuthbertson, Karel Stepanek,...
- 11/5/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Sophia Loren celebrates her 85th birthday on September 20, 2019. Though she rose to fame thanks largely to her looks, the Italian superstar more than proved her acting chops with a series of international hits and an Oscar win for Best Actress. But how many of her titles remain classics? In honor of her birthday, let’s take a look back at 15 of her greatest films, ranked worst to best.
SEEOscar Best Actress Gallery: Every Winner in Academy Award History
Born in 1934 in Rome, Loren began appearing in films both in her native Italy and in Hollywood, popping up in several titles that played more to her incredible beauty than her acting chops. That all changed with “Two Women” (1961), a stirring drama from Italian neorealist Vittoria De Sica that cast her as a mother protecting her daughter from the horrors of World War II. The role brought her international acclaim and Oscar,...
SEEOscar Best Actress Gallery: Every Winner in Academy Award History
Born in 1934 in Rome, Loren began appearing in films both in her native Italy and in Hollywood, popping up in several titles that played more to her incredible beauty than her acting chops. That all changed with “Two Women” (1961), a stirring drama from Italian neorealist Vittoria De Sica that cast her as a mother protecting her daughter from the horrors of World War II. The role brought her international acclaim and Oscar,...
- 9/20/2019
- by Chris Beachum and Zach Laws
- Gold Derby
This week at Tfe we're celebrating the centennial of one of cinema’s most prolific and legendary producers, Dino De Laurentiis. Here's Tim Brayton...
Yesterday, Eric took us on a tour of the first phase of Dino De Laurentiis's one-of-a-kind career as a producer, the era when he and Carlo Ponti helped usher a number of major works of late Neorealism into the world, introducing the first wave of international art cinema masterpieces. We now arrive at the 1960s, when De Laurenteiis was emboldened by those early successes to indulge himself in the first of his many flights of staggering, ill-advised ambition. Near the start of the decade, De Laurentiis opened a movie studio on the outskirts of Rome, an enormous playground for moviemaking nicknamed Dinocittà.
The Dinocittà experiment perfectly describes De Laurentiis's singular personality. A visionary producer can tell what is going to be popular in the future, and...
Yesterday, Eric took us on a tour of the first phase of Dino De Laurentiis's one-of-a-kind career as a producer, the era when he and Carlo Ponti helped usher a number of major works of late Neorealism into the world, introducing the first wave of international art cinema masterpieces. We now arrive at the 1960s, when De Laurenteiis was emboldened by those early successes to indulge himself in the first of his many flights of staggering, ill-advised ambition. Near the start of the decade, De Laurentiis opened a movie studio on the outskirts of Rome, an enormous playground for moviemaking nicknamed Dinocittà.
The Dinocittà experiment perfectly describes De Laurentiis's singular personality. A visionary producer can tell what is going to be popular in the future, and...
- 8/6/2019
- by Tim Brayton
- FilmExperience
Tony Sokol Jul 10, 2019
Rip Torn, who played characters from Judas Iscariot to the producer on The Larry Sanders Show, dies at 88.
Respected and versatile character actor Rip Torn died Tuesday in Lakeville, Conn., according to Variety. Publicist Rick Miramontez did not release a cause of death, but said Torn was with his wife, Amy Wright, and two daughters, Katie and Angelica. He was 88.
Torn believed actors should “play drama as comedy and comedy as drama,” according to the statement, and the actor was equally at home both. He starred in comedies like Albert Brooks' Defending Your Life and the Men in Black films, as well as TV comedies 30 Rock, playing General Electric CEO Don Geiss, mentor to Alec Baldwin’s Jack Donaghy, and Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Torn won an Emmy for his part in HBO's The Larry Sanders Show, and was nominated for a Tony award in...
Rip Torn, who played characters from Judas Iscariot to the producer on The Larry Sanders Show, dies at 88.
Respected and versatile character actor Rip Torn died Tuesday in Lakeville, Conn., according to Variety. Publicist Rick Miramontez did not release a cause of death, but said Torn was with his wife, Amy Wright, and two daughters, Katie and Angelica. He was 88.
Torn believed actors should “play drama as comedy and comedy as drama,” according to the statement, and the actor was equally at home both. He starred in comedies like Albert Brooks' Defending Your Life and the Men in Black films, as well as TV comedies 30 Rock, playing General Electric CEO Don Geiss, mentor to Alec Baldwin’s Jack Donaghy, and Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Torn won an Emmy for his part in HBO's The Larry Sanders Show, and was nominated for a Tony award in...
- 7/10/2019
- Den of Geek
Valentina Cortese, an Italian actress who held the extremely rare distinction of having been nominated for best supporting actress for her work in a foreign film, Francois Truffaut’s 1973 classic “Day for Night,” has died, according to Italian news agency Ansa. She was 96.
In Truffaut’s “Day for Night,” considered by many to be the best movie about making movies ever made, Cortese played, in the words of Roger Ebert, “the alcoholic diva past her prime.” The New York Times said: “The performances are superb. Miss Cortese and Miss Bisset are not only both hugely funny but also hugely affecting, in moments that creep up on you without warning.”
For a two-part, Carlo Ponti-produced 1948 film adaptation of “Les Miserables,” Cortese caused a sensation by playing both female leads, Fantine and Cosette. (The film was otherwise an adequate treatment of the Victor Hugo novel.)
“With Valentina Cortese’s passing, the...
In Truffaut’s “Day for Night,” considered by many to be the best movie about making movies ever made, Cortese played, in the words of Roger Ebert, “the alcoholic diva past her prime.” The New York Times said: “The performances are superb. Miss Cortese and Miss Bisset are not only both hugely funny but also hugely affecting, in moments that creep up on you without warning.”
For a two-part, Carlo Ponti-produced 1948 film adaptation of “Les Miserables,” Cortese caused a sensation by playing both female leads, Fantine and Cosette. (The film was otherwise an adequate treatment of the Victor Hugo novel.)
“With Valentina Cortese’s passing, the...
- 7/10/2019
- by Carmel Dagan
- Variety Film + TV
Actor Rip Torn, who earned Oscar and Tony nominations as well as an Emmy Award and two Obies, has died Tuesday in Lakeville Conn., his representative confirmed. He was 88.
Torn was equally at home in the comedy of the “Men in Black” film series or TV’s “The Larry Sanders Show” (for which he won his Emmy) and in the drama of “Sweet Bird of Youth” or “Anna Christie,” to name two of the numerous classic works of theater in which he appeared.
The actor was nominated for a supporting-actor Oscar in 1984 for his work as a father who confronts tragedy in Martin Ritt’s “Cross Creek,” one of many rural dramas in which he appeared during his career.
He drew a Tony nomination in 1960 for his first performance on Broadway, as the sadistic son of the town boss in Elia Kazan’s original production of Tennessee Williams’ “Sweet Bird of Youth.
Torn was equally at home in the comedy of the “Men in Black” film series or TV’s “The Larry Sanders Show” (for which he won his Emmy) and in the drama of “Sweet Bird of Youth” or “Anna Christie,” to name two of the numerous classic works of theater in which he appeared.
The actor was nominated for a supporting-actor Oscar in 1984 for his work as a father who confronts tragedy in Martin Ritt’s “Cross Creek,” one of many rural dramas in which he appeared during his career.
He drew a Tony nomination in 1960 for his first performance on Broadway, as the sadistic son of the town boss in Elia Kazan’s original production of Tennessee Williams’ “Sweet Bird of Youth.
- 7/10/2019
- by Carmel Dagan
- Variety Film + TV
Auteurist film books from the early ’70s touted the crime pictures of Jean-Pierre Melville, a Yankeephile Frenchman who chose a new name for himself and embraced crime pix because he loved John Huston’s The Asphalt Jungle. This tale of utter ruthlessness among thieves is one of Melville’s best. The great Jean-Paul Belmondo and Serge Reggiani leading a superior cast of underworld losers: Fabienne Dali, Michel Piccoli, Jean Desailly and Monique Hennessy.
Le Doulos
Blu-ray
Kl Studio Classics
1962 / B&w / 1:66 widescreen / 109 min. / Street Date July 2, 2019 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95
Starring: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Serge Reggiani, Fabienne Dali, Michel Piccoli, Jean Desailly, René Lefèvre, Aimé De March, Monique Hennessy, Carl Studer.
Cinematography: Nicolas Hayer
Film Editor: Monique Bonnot
Original Music: Paul Misraki
Written by Jean-Pierre Melville from a book by Pierre Lesou
Produced by Carlo Ponti, Georges De Beauregard
Directed by Jean-Pierre Melville
Having plumbed the libraries of some of...
Le Doulos
Blu-ray
Kl Studio Classics
1962 / B&w / 1:66 widescreen / 109 min. / Street Date July 2, 2019 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95
Starring: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Serge Reggiani, Fabienne Dali, Michel Piccoli, Jean Desailly, René Lefèvre, Aimé De March, Monique Hennessy, Carl Studer.
Cinematography: Nicolas Hayer
Film Editor: Monique Bonnot
Original Music: Paul Misraki
Written by Jean-Pierre Melville from a book by Pierre Lesou
Produced by Carlo Ponti, Georges De Beauregard
Directed by Jean-Pierre Melville
Having plumbed the libraries of some of...
- 7/2/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Thomas also suggested the UK film establishment undervalued Roeg in his lifetime.
Award-winning UK producer Jeremy Thomas has paid heartfelt tribute to Nicolas Roeg, with whom he collaborated on films including Insignificance, Bad Timing and Eureka.
Roeg died aged 90 on Saturday (November 26).
“I will miss him forever. I had a 10-year lesson from him about everything,” said Thomas, speaking from Rome this weekend. “He was one of the greatest, if not the greatest, director I worked with and he left a legacy of magnificent films.”
As well as his directorial credits Thomas cited Roeg’s work as a cinematographer on...
Award-winning UK producer Jeremy Thomas has paid heartfelt tribute to Nicolas Roeg, with whom he collaborated on films including Insignificance, Bad Timing and Eureka.
Roeg died aged 90 on Saturday (November 26).
“I will miss him forever. I had a 10-year lesson from him about everything,” said Thomas, speaking from Rome this weekend. “He was one of the greatest, if not the greatest, director I worked with and he left a legacy of magnificent films.”
As well as his directorial credits Thomas cited Roeg’s work as a cinematographer on...
- 11/27/2018
- by Geoffrey Macnab
- ScreenDaily
7 random things that happened on this day, September 17th, in showbiz history...
1931 Anna Maria Louisa Italiano born in The Bronx. She's goes on to become Anne Bancroft, one of the all time greats of stage and screen.
← 1957 Here's a truly odd bit of trivia. Sophia Loren was married by proxy on this day. Two male attorneys stood in for her and producer Carlo Ponti (who gave her stage name and groomed her public image -- they first met in 1950 when Sophia was only 16). Ponti was not legally divorced from his previous wife so the marriage was annulled to escape bigamy charges and then they married again in 1966, but legally this time; they remained married for the rest of his life! But how crazy, right?
1963 The Fugitive premieres on ABC...
1931 Anna Maria Louisa Italiano born in The Bronx. She's goes on to become Anne Bancroft, one of the all time greats of stage and screen.
← 1957 Here's a truly odd bit of trivia. Sophia Loren was married by proxy on this day. Two male attorneys stood in for her and producer Carlo Ponti (who gave her stage name and groomed her public image -- they first met in 1950 when Sophia was only 16). Ponti was not legally divorced from his previous wife so the marriage was annulled to escape bigamy charges and then they married again in 1966, but legally this time; they remained married for the rest of his life! But how crazy, right?
1963 The Fugitive premieres on ABC...
- 9/17/2018
- by NATHANIEL R
- FilmExperience
There’s a powerful scene in the newly released film Chappaquiddick in which an exasperated, wheelchair-bound Joe Kennedy fiercely slaps his son, Ted. The monomaniacal old man is in a rage that Senator Ted, groomed to be the next Kennedy president, now faces ruin for driving his car off a bridge, thus drowning a young girl.
The question is, how many filmgoers will witness this riveting moment; as with most mid-budget dramatic films, Chappaquiddick, though superbly crafted, will battle it out this weekend with John Krasinski’s potential genre sleeper A Quiet Place, the racy comedy Blockers, or the returning Ready Player One. While the movie distributed by Byron Allen’s Entertainment Studios relates an important chapter in a great family saga, it lacks the scale and depth (and marketing campaign) required to make a dent in today’s marketplace. At 100 minutes, filmgoers may feel that it plays more like...
The question is, how many filmgoers will witness this riveting moment; as with most mid-budget dramatic films, Chappaquiddick, though superbly crafted, will battle it out this weekend with John Krasinski’s potential genre sleeper A Quiet Place, the racy comedy Blockers, or the returning Ready Player One. While the movie distributed by Byron Allen’s Entertainment Studios relates an important chapter in a great family saga, it lacks the scale and depth (and marketing campaign) required to make a dent in today’s marketplace. At 100 minutes, filmgoers may feel that it plays more like...
- 4/6/2018
- by Peter Bart
- Deadline Film + TV
Stephen Weeks writes: In the early 1970s I was directing a film version of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight for Carlo Ponti. Robert Hardy was playing Sir Bertilak and his scenes were shot outside Cardiff in the Victorian gothic Castell Coch, of which Tim, as I knew him, was temporarily lord. Ordering the porter to let some light in as Gawain stumbles into his dark hall, Tim spoke the scripted words “open those shutters there” with such a flourish that the whole unit adopted them as its catchphrase for the following weeks.
However, a week later, luckily not at work, Tim fell off a horse and was in a wheelchair for the rest of the film. I was able to photograph Sir Bertilak standing from the back with a double, and then cut to close-ups of him while sitting in the chair. But then the editor said that the...
However, a week later, luckily not at work, Tim fell off a horse and was in a wheelchair for the rest of the film. I was able to photograph Sir Bertilak standing from the back with a double, and then cut to close-ups of him while sitting in the chair. But then the editor said that the...
- 8/6/2017
- by Stephen Weeks and Stephen Bates
- The Guardian - Film News
Elle
Blu-ray
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
2017 / Color / 2.40:1 widescreen / Street Date March 14, 2017
Starring: Isabelle Huppert, Laurent Lafitte, Anne Consigny, Charles Berling.
Cinematography: Stéphane Fontaine
Film Editor: Job Ter Burg
Written by David Birke
Produced by Saïd Ben Saïd and Michel Merkt
Directed by Paul Verhoeven
Michèle Leblanc, glamorous entrepreneur of a successful video game company, is the calm at the center of many storms. Her son’s girlfriend has given birth to another man’s child, an employee is stalking her with anime porn and her botox-ridden mother is betrothed to a male prostitute.
In the face of all this outrageous fortune, Michèle remains cool, calm and collected, even in the aftermath of her own harrowing sexual assault.
Elle, the new film from the Dutch provocateur Paul Verhoeven, begins with that already infamous assault, our heroine struggling under the weight of her attacker while an unblinking cat perches nearby, watching.
Blu-ray
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
2017 / Color / 2.40:1 widescreen / Street Date March 14, 2017
Starring: Isabelle Huppert, Laurent Lafitte, Anne Consigny, Charles Berling.
Cinematography: Stéphane Fontaine
Film Editor: Job Ter Burg
Written by David Birke
Produced by Saïd Ben Saïd and Michel Merkt
Directed by Paul Verhoeven
Michèle Leblanc, glamorous entrepreneur of a successful video game company, is the calm at the center of many storms. Her son’s girlfriend has given birth to another man’s child, an employee is stalking her with anime porn and her botox-ridden mother is betrothed to a male prostitute.
In the face of all this outrageous fortune, Michèle remains cool, calm and collected, even in the aftermath of her own harrowing sexual assault.
Elle, the new film from the Dutch provocateur Paul Verhoeven, begins with that already infamous assault, our heroine struggling under the weight of her attacker while an unblinking cat perches nearby, watching.
- 3/27/2017
- by Charlie Largent
- Trailers from Hell
Elizabeth Taylor was one of the most beautiful actresses to ever grace the silver screen. But while her looks may have been unparalleled, there was one woman she worried might lead her love Richard Burton astray — Sophia Loren.
In his new memoir, My Life in Focus: A Photographer’s Journey with Elizabeth Taylor and the Hollywood Jet Set, Italian photographer Gianni Bozzacchi opened up about the his close relationship with Taylor and Burton. He first met them on the set of 1967’s The Comedians, and spent years traveling the globe with them afterwards.
Taylor and Burton had one of Hollywood’s most tumultuous relationships.
In his new memoir, My Life in Focus: A Photographer’s Journey with Elizabeth Taylor and the Hollywood Jet Set, Italian photographer Gianni Bozzacchi opened up about the his close relationship with Taylor and Burton. He first met them on the set of 1967’s The Comedians, and spent years traveling the globe with them afterwards.
Taylor and Burton had one of Hollywood’s most tumultuous relationships.
- 1/14/2017
- by Dave Quinn
- PEOPLE.com
Close-Up is a column that spotlights films now playing on Mubi. Vittorio de Sica's Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow (1963) is playing January 8 - February 6, 2017 in the United States.Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow (1963), winner of the 1965 Oscar for Best Foreign Film, is a trio of stories directed by Vittorio De Sica in the omnibus fashion so popular at the time (just the year prior, he had contributed to the similarly structured Boccaccio ‘70, alongside Federico Fellini, Mario Monicelli, and Luchino Visconti). Spearheaded by international super-producer Carlo Ponti—helping to ensure global distribution and award-worthy prestige—the film is, first and foremost, a collaborative compendium of what partially defined the popular perception of its versatile director and its two leads, Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni.The first short, “Adelina,” was written by Eduardo De Filippo and Isabella Quarantotti, the second, “Anna,” by Bella Billa, Lorenza Zanuso, and one of Italian neorealism’s founding fathers,...
- 1/8/2017
- MUBI
That naughty boy Federico Fellini goes all out with this essay-hallucination about women, a surreal odyssey that hurls Marcello Mastroianni into a world in which women are no longer putting up with male nonsense. It's an honest (if still somewhat sexist) effort by an artist acknowledging illusions and pleasures that he knows are infantile. City of Women Blu-ray Cohen Media Group 1980 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 139 min. / La cittá delle donne / Street Date May 31, 2016 / 39.98 Starring Marcello Mastroianni, Anna Prucnal, Bernice Stegers, Iole Silvani, Donatella Damiani, Ettore Manni, Fiammetta Baralla, Catherine Carrel, Rose Alba. Cinematography Giuseppe Rotunno Film Editor Ruggero Mastroianni Original Music Luis Bacalov Written by Brunello Rondi, Bernardino Zapponi, Federico Fellini Produced by Franco Rossellini, Renzo Rossellini, Daniel Toscan du Plantier Directed by Federico Fellini
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Federico Fellini's 1980 City of Women was called 'wonderfully uninhibited' by The New York Times. Fellini's output slowed to a crawl in the 1970s,...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Federico Fellini's 1980 City of Women was called 'wonderfully uninhibited' by The New York Times. Fellini's output slowed to a crawl in the 1970s,...
- 5/31/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
What?
Written by Gérard Brach, Roman Polanski
Directed by Roman Polanski
Italy/France/Germany, 1972
You can forgive Roman Polanski if he wanted to take things easy in 1972 and make a light-hearted, frivolous little movie. Less than two years removed from the grisly Manson family murders that took from the acclaimed filmmaker his wife and unborn child, Polanski first confronted his troubled demons with a suitably grim adaptation of Macbeth (1971). After that, apparently ready for solace of a livelier variety, he and a motley crew of friends and associates set sail for Carlo Ponti’s extravagant Italian villa. There they made the peculiarly disappointing What?, a raucous sex comedy without much sex and with very little comedy.
What? begins as globe-trotting Nancy (Sydne Rome) has hitched a ride with some Italian natives. As she speaks of her touristic adventures, the men in the car are more focused on her palpable sexuality.
Written by Gérard Brach, Roman Polanski
Directed by Roman Polanski
Italy/France/Germany, 1972
You can forgive Roman Polanski if he wanted to take things easy in 1972 and make a light-hearted, frivolous little movie. Less than two years removed from the grisly Manson family murders that took from the acclaimed filmmaker his wife and unborn child, Polanski first confronted his troubled demons with a suitably grim adaptation of Macbeth (1971). After that, apparently ready for solace of a livelier variety, he and a motley crew of friends and associates set sail for Carlo Ponti’s extravagant Italian villa. There they made the peculiarly disappointing What?, a raucous sex comedy without much sex and with very little comedy.
What? begins as globe-trotting Nancy (Sydne Rome) has hitched a ride with some Italian natives. As she speaks of her touristic adventures, the men in the car are more focused on her palpable sexuality.
- 5/19/2016
- by Jeremy Carr
- SoundOnSight
What is this -- a naughty sex odyssey as absurdist art? Or a non-pc slice of sleazy art film exploitation? Either way it's a (minor) Polanski masterpiece of direction, influenced by the Italian setting. Is what turns Polanski on? The entire excercise is a Kafka comedy of erotic discomfort. What? Blu-ray Severin 1972 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 110 min. / Che? / Street Date April 26, 2016 / 29.95 Starring Marcello Mastroianni, Sydne Rome, Hugh Griffith, Guido Alberti, Gianfranco Piacentini, Romollo Valli. Cinematography Marcello Gatti, Giuseppe Ruzzolini Production Design Aurelio Crugnola Film Editor Alastair McIntyre Original Music Claudio Gizzi Written by Gérard Brach, Roman Polanski Produced by Carlo Ponti Directed by Roman Polanski
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
It's a slippery slope, I tell you: art films are the gateway to surrealism, and surrealism connects straight to bondage and kinky costume play, which is a direct conduit either to Comic-Con or being forced to resign from the P.T.A.
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
It's a slippery slope, I tell you: art films are the gateway to surrealism, and surrealism connects straight to bondage and kinky costume play, which is a direct conduit either to Comic-Con or being forced to resign from the P.T.A.
- 5/7/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
The famously perverse French New Wave director set himself up for a fall – then made one of his most exquisite and approachable movies
The title of Jean-Luc Godard’s first movie in colour is not misbegotten. Contempt (Le Mépris in French) was the one thing not in short supply when the film-maker decamped to Cinecitta Studios in Rome to make a film of an Alberto Moravia novel (for which he had equal contempt) about the making of a film of Homer’s Odyssey. Godard hated his overbearing and cartoonish big-money producers Joseph E Levine and Carlo Ponti – he called them “King Kong” and “Mussolini” respectively – and stirred elements of their personalities into that of his on-screen producer, the boorish, money-driven philistine Jeremy Prokosch (Jack Palance). The exasperated Palance’s contempt for Godard’s working methods was also worked into the film itself.
Related: The essential Godard: five key films from...
The title of Jean-Luc Godard’s first movie in colour is not misbegotten. Contempt (Le Mépris in French) was the one thing not in short supply when the film-maker decamped to Cinecitta Studios in Rome to make a film of an Alberto Moravia novel (for which he had equal contempt) about the making of a film of Homer’s Odyssey. Godard hated his overbearing and cartoonish big-money producers Joseph E Levine and Carlo Ponti – he called them “King Kong” and “Mussolini” respectively – and stirred elements of their personalities into that of his on-screen producer, the boorish, money-driven philistine Jeremy Prokosch (Jack Palance). The exasperated Palance’s contempt for Godard’s working methods was also worked into the film itself.
Related: The essential Godard: five key films from...
- 1/4/2016
- by John Patterson
- The Guardian - Film News
Milos Forman was the prince of the Prague Spring with this Czech New Wave classic, a hilarious black comedy about the cheerful corruption and incompetence of petty bureaucrats. A fire brigade throws a bash, and by the end of the evening the lottery prizes are all stolen and the beauty contest has become a travesty. And they can't even put out a simple fire. The joke is clearly aimed at the Communist government. The Fireman's Ball Region-Free Blu-ray + Pal DVD Arrow Academy (UK) 1967 / Color / / 71 min. / Horí, má panenko / Street Date October 12, 2015 / Available from Amazon UK £14.99 Cinematography Miroslav Ondrícek Production Designer Karel Cerny Film Editor Miroslav Hájek Original Music Karel Mares Writing credits Milos Forman, Jaroslav Papousek, Ivan Passer and Václav Sasek Produced by Rudolf Hajek, Carlo Ponti Directed by Milos Forman
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
We know Milos Forman from his American pictures Hair and Ragtime, but he made big...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
We know Milos Forman from his American pictures Hair and Ragtime, but he made big...
- 11/17/2015
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni star in a serious drama about two outsiders in Mussolini's Rome of 1938, an ordinary housewife and a political undesirable. They have a lot in common, as it turns out. Writer-director Ettore Scola condemnation of an oppressive authoritarian state, addresses the most basic human rights violations. A Special Day Blu-ray The Criterion Collection 778 1977 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 107 min. / Una giornata particolare / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date October 13, 2015 / 39.95 Starring Sophia Loren, Marcello Mastroianni, John Vernon, Françoise Berd. Cinematography Pasqualino De Santis Film Editor Raimondo Crociani Original Music Armando Trovajoli Written by Ettore Scola, Ruggero Maccari, Maurizio Costanzo Produced by Carlo Ponti Directed by Ettore Scola
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Veteran Italian screenwriter and director Ettore Scola's best-known movie in the U.S. is 1974's We All Loved Each Other So Much, but my instant favorite is this 1977 drama. Movies about life under Fascism usually gravitate toward extreme,...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Veteran Italian screenwriter and director Ettore Scola's best-known movie in the U.S. is 1974's We All Loved Each Other So Much, but my instant favorite is this 1977 drama. Movies about life under Fascism usually gravitate toward extreme,...
- 11/3/2015
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Sophia Loren talks to Ian Woodward about Peter Sellars, Richard Burton and overcoming her shyness on screen
There are those who maintain that Sophia Loren is all fuse and no bang: she never seems to be ill, or fed up, or bored. Her answer is that she has never suffered from the feeling that she is missing something, for the simple reason that she knows she is not. It takes a lifetime’s wisdom, or a healthy bank balance, to reach that sort of conclusion.
Four years ago the Rome municipal tax collector’s office declared La Loren as the woman with the biggest income in Rome - a taxable figure of £231,100. Incidentally (because it helps feed the mouth of wisdom), the second highest income earner in the city was her husband, director Carlo Ponti, with a figure of £188,000. You can see how, with a cool £400,000 between you, it is...
There are those who maintain that Sophia Loren is all fuse and no bang: she never seems to be ill, or fed up, or bored. Her answer is that she has never suffered from the feeling that she is missing something, for the simple reason that she knows she is not. It takes a lifetime’s wisdom, or a healthy bank balance, to reach that sort of conclusion.
Four years ago the Rome municipal tax collector’s office declared La Loren as the woman with the biggest income in Rome - a taxable figure of £231,100. Incidentally (because it helps feed the mouth of wisdom), the second highest income earner in the city was her husband, director Carlo Ponti, with a figure of £188,000. You can see how, with a cool £400,000 between you, it is...
- 8/29/2015
- by Ian Woodward
- The Guardian - Film News
Songs On Screen: All week HitFix will be featuring tributes by writers to their favorite musical moments from TV and film. Check out all the entries in the series here. With its exotic setting, tortured emotion, and overbearing soundtrack, "Doctor Zhivago" is the perfect Bollywood movie, despite not technically being in Hindi. Its iconic refrain, “Lara’s Theme,” is as familiar and evocative a leitmotif to an entire generation of Indians as Darth Vader’s Imperial March is to Anglophones. To talk about the theme is to talk about the entire movie, as it appears at least 15 times, with additional versions on the official soundtrack. Composer Maurice Jarre famously protested its overuse when producer Carlo Ponti trimmed the rest of the score, but Ponti, still mainlining pleasure to the masses on his Hundred And Second Film, knew what he was doing. Jarre won an Academy Award. In the late 1960s,...
- 6/24/2015
- by Priyanka Mattoo
- Hitfix
Anne Marie from the AFI Fest on an International Legend...
At age 80, Sophia Loren is still magnetic. When the Academy Award-winning actress appeared onstage at the Dolby Theatre on Wednesday night for an AFI Fest tribute to her career, she received a two-minute long standing ovation. The audience whooped and yelled "Bellisima" before Loren, elegant in a black gown studded with crystals, could do more than walk onstage and smile. Once the furor died down, Rob Marshall, her director for Nine, interviewed Sophia Loren about her career, co-stars, and controversies.
“When I saw the movies, I forgot the war, forgot hunger. It was possible to believe there was another life than the one I was in.”
Despite her glamorous image, Loren's description of her early life growing up poor in the slums of Italy was bleak. When she met her husband, producer Carlo Ponti (who passed away in 2007), he took...
At age 80, Sophia Loren is still magnetic. When the Academy Award-winning actress appeared onstage at the Dolby Theatre on Wednesday night for an AFI Fest tribute to her career, she received a two-minute long standing ovation. The audience whooped and yelled "Bellisima" before Loren, elegant in a black gown studded with crystals, could do more than walk onstage and smile. Once the furor died down, Rob Marshall, her director for Nine, interviewed Sophia Loren about her career, co-stars, and controversies.
“When I saw the movies, I forgot the war, forgot hunger. It was possible to believe there was another life than the one I was in.”
Despite her glamorous image, Loren's description of her early life growing up poor in the slums of Italy was bleak. When she met her husband, producer Carlo Ponti (who passed away in 2007), he took...
- 11/14/2014
- by Anne Marie
- FilmExperience
By Scott Feinberg
The Hollywood Reporter
Sophia Loren is the face of this year’s AFI Fest: A dazzling photo of the actress, taken in 1965, beckons from this year’s event poster. And on Nov. 12, the festival will hold a special tribute to Loren, 80, that will include a screening of one of her most memorable movies, 1964’s Marriage Italian Style, in which she played opposite her frequent co-star Marcello Mastroianni under the direction of Vittorio De Sica; a presentation of the short film The Human Voice, directed by Edoardo Ponti, one of her two sons by her late husband, producer Carlo Ponti; and a conversation with the actress, who, says festival director Jacqueline Lyanga, is still “so beautiful, radiant and glamorous.” Speaking by phone from her home in Geneva, Loren says of her latest honor: “It gives me a kind of security and the sense that maybe what I’ve...
The Hollywood Reporter
Sophia Loren is the face of this year’s AFI Fest: A dazzling photo of the actress, taken in 1965, beckons from this year’s event poster. And on Nov. 12, the festival will hold a special tribute to Loren, 80, that will include a screening of one of her most memorable movies, 1964’s Marriage Italian Style, in which she played opposite her frequent co-star Marcello Mastroianni under the direction of Vittorio De Sica; a presentation of the short film The Human Voice, directed by Edoardo Ponti, one of her two sons by her late husband, producer Carlo Ponti; and a conversation with the actress, who, says festival director Jacqueline Lyanga, is still “so beautiful, radiant and glamorous.” Speaking by phone from her home in Geneva, Loren says of her latest honor: “It gives me a kind of security and the sense that maybe what I’ve...
- 11/7/2014
- by Anjelica Oswald
- Scott Feinberg
Good for her! Sophia Loren was told to get plastic surgery in the early stages of her career, but she refused to cave. The legendary actress and classic beauty recently opened up to The Hollywood Reporter about her struggle deflecting people's opinions about her physical appearance. "I always tried not to listen to these people," Loren, 80, told the mag. "They were saying that my nose was too long and my mouth was too big." The issue became so big that her late husband Carlo Ponti even commented [...]...
- 11/6/2014
- Us Weekly
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