Marisa Paredes Movies

Following in the footsteps of her father, actor-cum-director Ugo Tognazzi, and her brother, director Ricky Tognazzi, Maria Sole Tognazzi makes her helming debut with the emotionally-amped melodrama L'Uomo che ama (The Man Who Loves). At its core, the film embodies an exploration of gay-influenced heterosexual perspectives and attitudes in the early 21st century. Pierfrancesco Favino stars as Roberto, a straight Turin-based pharmacist emotionally attached to his younger brother, the homosexual Carlo (Michele Alhaique). Roberto witnesses Carlo's delirious happiness with lover Yuri (Glen Blackhall) and feels extremely envious that Carlo has found someone. Though Roberto has proven himself capable of landing successful relationships in the past - his previous lovers include sexy hotel employee Sara (Ksenia Rappoport) and the drop-dead-gorgeous art gallery proprietor Alba (Monica Bellucci) - these relationships invariably ended in heartbreak, with Roberto either being dumped (in the case of Sara) or abandoning his partner (in the case of Alba). As time rolls on, he begins to feel a palpable sense of his own lingering happiness and dissatisfaction, and attempts to reconcile this with his convictions that everyone else in the world is completely satisfied with life. ~ Nathan Southern, Rovi

The efforts of an American ex-patriot living on a remote Mediterranean to establish himself as a serious musician are constantly thwarted by every inhabitant of his small village in director Francesca Joseph's ensemble comedy drama. Larry (Stanley Tucci) thought that by moving to the village that was once home to a celebrated European composer he would find inspiration, but instead he just spends his nights playing for peanuts in the local pubs. Eventually Larry becomes convinced that if he stages a gala tribute to the late composer the locals will finally take note of his talent. But organizing such a lavish event and convincing the late composer's widow (Marisa Paredes) to allow her esteemed late-husband's works to be played publicly by a famed pianist (Virgile Bramley) isn't going to be easy, especially when it begins to seem like everyone wants their say in the event. Now, with everyone from Larry's neurotic partner Miranda (Jessica Stevenson) to the late musician's lovely muse Helena (Emmanuelle Seigner), opportunistic Englishman Sebastian (Hugh Bonneville) and his capricious brother Dickie (Rhys Ifans), and even Larry's long lost daughter Frankie (Jena Malone) crawling out of the woodwork, the put upon pianist will have to balance out the chaos that swirls around him if he holds out any hope of delivering his true masterwork. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Adapted from author Agustina Bessa-Luis' novel The Soul of the Righ, writer/director Manoel de Oliveira's Magic Mirror travels deep into the restless psyche of a well-to-do woman who longs to experience a divine vision. Previously imprisoned for a crime he didn't commit, Luciano (Ricardo Trepa) emerges into the real world in desperate need of a sense of direction. Luciano is haunted by the death of his sister Camila, though he does his best to stay distracted from family ghosts by going to work at the manor house of malcontent rich woman Alfreda (Leonor Silveira). Married to the much older Bahia (Duarte de Almeida), Alfreda has no children and spends much of her time discussing religious issues with eccentric Bible scholar Herschel (Michel Piccoli). When man-in-waiting Luciano fails to convince Alfreda that her fixation on the Virgin Mary is merely a delusion brought about by mental malaise, he subsequently hires local girl Filipe (Luis Miguel Cintra) to pose as the Madonna as part of an elaborate, but obscure, ruse. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Guillermo del Toro, who quickly became one of the most talked-about directors in contemporary horror films with his first two features, Chronos and Mimic, takes on a more subtle tale of terror with this psychological suspense piece. Casares (Federico Luppi) and Carmen (Marisa Paredes) operate a small home for orphans in a remote part of Spain during the Spanish Civil War. Helping the couple mind the orphanage are Jacinto (Eduardo Noriega), the groundskeeper, and Conchita (Irene Visedo), a teacher who is also involved with Jacinto. Casares and Carmen are aligned with the Republican loyalists, and are hiding a large cache of gold that's used to back the Republican treasury; perhaps not coincidentally, the orphanage has also been subject to attacks from Franco's troops, and an unexploded bomb waits to be defused in the home's courtyard. One day, a boy named Carlos (Fernando Tielve) arrives at the home, looking for a place to stay after being left behind by his parents. Casares and Carmen take him in, and the boy soon strikes up an unlikely friendship with Jaime (Inigo Garces), a boy with a reputation for tormenting other kids. But Carlos soon begins having visions of a mysterious apparition he can't identify, and hears strange stories about a child named Santi who went missing the day the bomb appeared near the orphanage. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Swiss director Alain Tanner, who wowed audiences in the 1970s with his art house classic Jonah, Who Will Be 25 in the Year 2000 (1976), returns to the same territory with this decidedly more downbeat film. The movie details the life of Jonah (Jerome Robart), who has indeed just turned 25. A recent film school graduate, he is living with his Senegalese girlfriend and childhood sweetheart Lila (Aissa Maiga), and occasionally shooting documentaries. The film explores the shifting emotional landscape of Jonah and Lila's relationship as the two take in a boarder, Irina - a Russian woman on the lam from Soviet mobsters, for whom she made an adult movie. Meanwhile, Lila longs to return to Senegal to be with her grandmother. Jonas et Lila, a Demain ran at the 1999 San Sebastian Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

In this erotic French-Italian-Spanish drama, Max (Georges Corraface), having spent a decade behind bars on a murder conviction, exits the prison a free man. Mysterious museum-worker Mila (Anna Galiena) is parked at the prison gate and speaks to him from her car. Mila is married to businessman Simon (Jean-Marc Barr), who doesn't satisfy her sexually. Later, when Max descends into a basement cafe to use the rest-room, he spots Mila at a pay phone, approaches her, and they have sex amid the rest-room urinals. Max gives her his phone number, and they rendezvous at an upscale hotel. When Max begins following Mila and spying on her, he makes a startling discovery -- her husband is his own brother. Shown at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, Rovi

In this WW II tragicomedy, famed Italian funnyman Roberto Benigni (The Monster) portrays Guido, who moves during the '30s from the country to a Tuscan town, where he is entranced by schoolteacher Dora (Nicoletta Braschi, Benigni's real-life wife). Dora likes Guido, but she remains faithful to her pompous fiancé, so Guido has an uphill struggle. Meanwhile, anti-Semitic attitudes lead to attacks against Guido's Jewish uncle (Giustino Durano). Leaping ahead to five years later, during WW II, Guido and Dora are married and have a son Giosue (Giorgio Cantarini). After they are imprisoned in a concentration camp, Guido goes to elaborate lengths to keep his son from understanding the truth of their situation. He tells the boy that they are competing with others to win an armored tank -- so everything from food shortages to tattoos is explained as necessary for participation in the contest. ~ Bhob Stewart, Rovi

Marcello Mastroianni plays several different roles in this off-beat, witty exploration of a man with multiple personalities from world-class filmmaker Raúl Ruiz. Mastroianni first appears as Parisian traveling salesman Mateo Strano who suddenly shows up at the home of Maria, the wife he abandoned twenty years before. She eventually remarried Andre. Mateo begins telling the skeptical Andre that he never really left Marie. Instead he was bewitched by fairies and has been living in the apartment across the street the entire time. He seems so serious, that he is able to lure Andre to the alleged apartment. There Mateo murders him with a hammer and then calmly returns to Maria who seems nonplused by the sudden turn. With pride she shows Mateo their adopted daughter. Mastroianni next appears as Sorbonne professor of negative anthropology Georges Vickers, a grown man who still lives with his cranky mother until he inexplicably leaves to become a vagrant. Living on the streets, he encounters Tania, a streetwalker with a passion for the philosophies of author Carlos Castaneda's Don Juan. The hooker and the tramp stay together until the day that Vickers returns and he leaves. It is soon afterward that he discovers that Tania is really the president of a major corporation. When he learns that she has been jailed for attempting to murder her creepy ex-husband, Vickers uses his clout to save her. The story then jumps to a newlywed couple happily struggling in a humble garret. Their lives change dramatically when a benefactor suddenly appears and provides them with a marvelous country house. They are also given a mute butler (Mastroianni) who answers their every beck and call. It doesn't take the couple long to figure out that the sinister valet (who actually owns the chateau) is quietly poisoning them. In terror they leave, but later he finds them and demands that they give him their baby daughter. He gives the child to Maria, Mateo's wife. Mastroianni's fourth persona, that of industrial magnate Luc Alamand then appears. He is in trouble when he learns that the wife, daughter, and sister he manufactured to impress potential clients are actually coming. The stress causes the sudden emergence of his other disparate personalities. Interestingly, though each live wildly different lives, they are clearly the same mild-mannered, self-effacing character. The comedy in the story works on wildly different levels with sight gags and puns running simultaneously with literary and cultural satire. Beneath it all runs a serious message about the destructiveness and confusion caused by trying to create a single European culture. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

When a respected Native American chief is taken to trial for burning down a large multiplex adjacent to an ancient Mapuche burial ground, a seasoned lawyer comes to his defense in the courtroom. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

From Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar (Live Flesh, All About My Mother) comes this offbeat drama about Leo Macías (Marisa Paredes), a romance novelist who writes her trashy tomes under the pseudonym Amanda Gris. When her marriage begins to dissolve, Leo finds herself falling into despair, leading her to drink and lose her knack for writing her tawdry tales. Out of her turmoil, she writes a bleak novel that garners no attention. To make matters worse, Ángel (Juan Echanove), a newspaper editor with a romantic interest in Leo, hires her to write a scathing review of Amanda Gris, not realizing Gris is Leo's nom de plume. Nominated for several Goya awards, La Flor de Mi Secreto also stars Carmen Elías and Rossy de Palma. ~ Matthew Tobey, Rovi

Ana Luz's husband has gone away for a little while. While he's away, she experiences every possible irruption into her house, from a troupe of actors to a woman claiming to be her husband's lover. She seems to kill a plumber with her screwdriver, and her neighbor apparently kills a policeman. Just when she "wakes up" and decides she may be dreaming, it begins to seem as though she isn't, in this directionless would-be comedy. Many aspire to avant-garde and radical humor, including the seasoned pros who made this film, but even hardened reviewers were embarrassed for the makers of this movie. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi