Films
8 1/2	[DVD] 791.43 E34 [VHS] 791.43 E34
Fellini's autobiographical film is about a famous film director who loses his inspiration in the midst of making a film.
Amarcord	[DVD] 791.43 A4853
The film is Director Federico Fellini's lange of memories of episodes about love, sex, politics, family life and growing up in a small Italian town in the 1930's.
Benito: The Rise and Fall of Benito Mussolini	[DVD] 791.43 B4673
Benito Mussolini's political life and the evolution of fascism is chronicled in this feature film.
The Bicycle Thief	[DVD] 791.43 B5838
This film is the story of an unemployed man and his son in war devastated Rome. The father finds a job pasting up posters, work requiring a bicycle to get around. The bicycle is stolen; panic stricken at being unable to recover his bicycle and at the prospect of losing his job, the father is compelled to steal a bicycle, only to be caught and humiliated in front of his son.
Bitter Rice	[VHS] 791.43 B6245
In the rice fields of the Po Valley, a thief on the run meets a girl who tries to steal his loot.
Cinema Paradiso	[DVD] 791.43 C5744 [VHS] 791.43 C5744
A young boy in a small Italian village is befriended by the projectionist at the movie theater, the Cinema Paradiso. As the boy grows up, he learns to love films, and is encouraged by his good friend to pursue his dream of one day making movies.
Citta Aperta (Open City)	[VHS] 791.43 O614
Rossellini's classic is representative of neo-realistic cinema. The story takes place in Rome during the Nazi occupation where a priest who is helping the Italian resistance fighters is discovered and arrested by the SS.
The Conformist	[DVD] 791.43 C7486
A weak-willed Italian man becomes a fascist flunky who goes to Paris to arrange the assassination of his old teacher, now a political dissident
La Dolce Vita	[DVD] 791.43 D6621 [VHS] 791.43 D6621
This is Fellini's most famous film in which he chronicles the meaningless decadence of Roman high society, aristocrats, performers, the press, etc. In its day, the film was considered shocking. Today its limited nudity seems tame.
The Garden of the Finzi-Continis	[DVD] 791.43 G2185
This drama is set in Italy in 1938, when Mussolini's anti-Semitic edicts began to isolate the Jews from their communities. Among them were the Finzi-Continis, an aristocratic Jewish family forced for the first time to acknowledge the world beyond its fenced garden.
Il Grido	[DVD] 791.43 G8475
A man is bereft when his married lover of seven years decides suddenly to leave him when her husband dies. He takes their child and wanders for a year, but realizes he can love only her.
Life is Beautiful	[DVD] 791.43 L7223 [VHS] 791.43 L7223
A charming but bumbling waiter who's gifted with a colorful imagination and an irresistible sense of humor has won the heart of the woman he loves and has created a beautiful life for his young family. Then that life is threatened by World War II.
Miracle in Milan	[VHS] 791.43 M6715
Comedy, satire, and realism are combined in a fantasy about the social conceits of man. An Italian orphan, with the aid of a miraculous dove, combats power and wealth and succeeds in bringing happiness to the inhabitants of a Milanese hobo camp.
Nights of Cabiria	[DVD] 791.43 N6885
A young prostitute who works in the streets of Rome is continually deceived by men who claim to love her.
Partner	[DVD] 791.43 P2737
The film tells the tale of Jacob a revolutionary who also happens to suffer from schizophrenia. He spends much of his time plotting a social upheaval that will single-handedly change the state of post-war Italy. Jacob devises this plan with a mysterious man whom he shares an apartment with, although they argue quite a bit in-between philosophical and political discussions. Jacob shakes things up when he falls for the daughter of someone from the university. This new love instantly puts his political scheming at risk doesn't make his 'partner' happy either.
The Postman (II Postino)	[DVD] 791.43 P8584 [VHS] 791.43 P8584
The postman, Mario, enlists the aid of the poet Pablo Neruda to conquer the heart of the beautiful Beatrice.
Seduction of Mimi	[DVD] 791.43 S4497
Mimi, a Sicilian laborer, refuses to vote for the Mafia's candidate and consequently loses his job, his wife, and his home. His efforts to defend his honor produce complex comical results.
Seven Beauties	[DVD] 791.43 S49702 [VHS] 791.43 S49702
Pasqualino is a lady's man living off his sisters' money until he is arrested and sent to the army. He is captured by the Germans and taken to a concentration camp where he plots his escape by seducing a German officer.
La Strada	[DVD] 791.43 S8952 [VHS] 791.43 S8952
The film tells the story of a fragile girl who falls in love with a brutal circus performer she was sold to by her mother.
Stromboli	[VHS] 791.43 S9213
A Lithuanian refugee girl marries a poor Sicilian fisherman to escape internment in post-war Italy, but finds herself imprisoned by the primitive and rigidly traditional society when the couple moves to a desert island
Swept Away	[DVD] 791.43 S9747 [VHS] 791.43 S9747
A wealthy upper-class capitalist and a proletariat deckhand on her yacht are marooned together on an uninhabited island for several weeks. The woman becomes totally dependent on the man for survival, falls in love with him, and the two temporarily reverse their roles
The Tree of Wooden Clogs	[DVD] 791.43 T7846 [VHS] 791.43 T7846
This is a two part film - deceptively simple tale of a small community of peasants in Italy at the turn of the century. It follows four families through the seasons, and shows the seemingly small events that influence their lives and the love they feel for the land and their families.
Two Women	[DVD] 791.43 T9747
Seeking escape from city bombing, an Italian mother and daughter travel war-torn Italy during World War II trying to survive near-starvation, rape by wandering soldiers and other horrors of war.
The Wide Blue Road	[DVD] 791.43 W6393
This film is set in a fishing village off the Dalmatian coast of Italy. It tells the story of Squarcio, a fisherman who uses dynamite instead of nets and is Gillo Pontecorvo's debut as a film director.
Educational and Documentary Films     Top of Page
Destination Italy	[DVD] 910.02 I883
The richness of Italy and its people are evident in this video.
The Fall of the Leaning Tower	[VHS] 726.04
The Leaning Tower of Pisa is a 14th-century architectural masterpiece and, to the engineers and architects responsible for keeping it from falling down, it is a monument to frustration. Although the problem is obvious, the solution is not.
Florence: Video Portrait of a City	[VHS] 945.02
This is a guided tour of the city of Florence.
Mussolini Italy's Nightmare	[VHS] 920.02 M9895
From his early days as a journalist to his shocking, renewed popularity in Italy today, this is the definitive look at the life and legacy of Il Duce.
My Voyage to Italy	[DVD] 791.43 M9959
Martin Scorsese directs and narrates this personal documentary about Italian film and select Italian filmmakers and the influence they had on him. It begins with an overview of Scorsese's family history including their Sicilian roots, life in Little Italy, and the filmmaker's recollections of watching neorealist and epic Italian films on television and how those movies acted as a lifeline for the older members of his family, maintaining their connection to the old country.
Parla Italiano? Learn to speak Italian, nouns, verbs & adjectives	[DVD] 458.3 P2524
Learn to speak Italian, nouns, verbs & adjectives.
Parla Italiano? Learning Italian - The Basics	[DVD] 458.3 P2523
Italian alphabet, consonants, vowels, phrases, titles, verbs, nationalities, and other topics. Presented with skits and graphics, in an "approachable" format.
Rome and the Alban Hills	[VHS] 941.01
This travelogue features the art and architecture of Rome, with insights into the ancient Roman world.
Italian Operas on Film     Top of Page
The Barber of Seville	[DVD] 792.5 R835ba
For his first opera production, Dario Fo, the theater director known for his brilliant wit, chose to stage Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia for the Netherlands Opera. First mounted in 1987, it was a huge success, and a live recording of its revival has been made
Don Giovanni	[DVD] 792.5 M939do
The story of Don Giovanni centers around a young nobleman who is obsessed with amorous conquests and his encounters with Donna Anna, the woman who plots to destroy him
Madama Butterfly	[DVD] 792.5 P977ma
Puccini's classic story of the young woman loved and abandoned by an American naval officer was recorded at Milan's fabled La Scala Opera House.
Rigoletto	[DVD] 792.5 V484ri
This is Verdi's opera about a hunchbacked jester whose daughter is seduced and abandoned by the local Duke.
La Traviata	[DVD] 792.5 V484tr
In Verdi's version of the Victor Hugo novel La Dame aux camélias, the party girl with a heart of gold leaves her young lover at the request of his father, and then dies of consumption.
Turandot	[DVD] 792.5 P977tu
This is a presentation of Puccini's opera Turandot about the Chinese princess and the young prince, disguised as a beggar, who loves her.
Music CD's     Top of Page
Calabria	780.89 C1415
The work chants of tuna fishermen of Vibo Valentia, the cries of the swordfishermen of Scilla; women, men and children singing songs of work and celebration, of love and scorn; tarantellas; and lullabies; music for bagpipe, tambourine, and drums.
Italy: Folk Songs from Naples	780.89 I883

Andrea Kempf, updated July 20, 2009

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