The award-winning film brings the viewer along for an extended stay on the European front line in the refugee crisis.

Cinematographer Francesco di Giacomo never lets an amazing shot go to waste, whether in sumptuous interiors or starkly beautiful landscapes. He is a master of chiaroscuro, rich texture, and, above all, framing.

Italian director Laura Bispuri’s debut film follows Mark (Alba Rohrwacher), an Albanian man who had renounced his female gender and taken a vow of chastity as a teen to escape a life of servitude.

Don’t be fooled by the European poster for Paolo Sorrentino’s latest amorphous film. It may be hard to pin down what type of movie this is, but it’s definitely not the spry sex comedy hinted at in the ad campaign, where stars Michael Caine and Harvey Keitel sit in a swimming pool staring gob-smacked at […]

The Italian countryside is no place for a teenage girl, at least not in Alice Rohrwacher’s The Wonders. Young Gelsomina (Maria Alexandra Lungu) lives with her parents and three younger sisters in a run-down farmhouse. Her German father, Wolfgang, insists they live off the grid, confining the family in joyless, hardscrabble bohemianism. Workdays on the […]

If you take the word sweet, whisk away the S and move a few letters around, you end up with twee. Asia Argento’s Misunderstood veers between the two states while chronicling the travails of a preteen girl and her eccentric family in 1980s Rome. Along the way the film flirts with peril and incendiary themes, […]

Written, Directed and Produced by Oren Jacoby Released by the Film Sales Company USA. 92 min. Not rated English and Italian with English subtitles What Americans may know of World War II’s impact on Italy is often centered on the Allies’ liberating invasion and the many World at War-type documentaries that repeat the  footage of […]

Directed by Paolo Virzì Produced by Fabrizio Donvito, Marco Cohen, and Benedetto Habib Written by Francesco Bruni, Francesco Piccolo and Paolo Virzì, freely adapted from the novel by Stephen Amidon Released by Film Movement Italian with English subtitles Italy. 110. Not rated With Fabrizio Bentivoglio, Valeria Golino, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Fabrizio Gifuni, Matilde Gioli, Guglielmo […]

Directed by Roberto Andò Produced by Angelo Barbagallo Written by Andò and Angelo Pasqune, based on the novel Il Trono Vuoto by Andò Released by Distrib Films Italy. 94 min. Not Rated With Toni Servillo, Valerio Mastandrea, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Michela Cescon, and Anna Bonaiuto This shape-shifting political drama-cum-satire begins in a staid, stately fashion […]