Massimo Serato Movies

This three-part romantic comedy illustrates that people are never too old to fall in love and often act too old when they are young. Silvio Ceccato plays a man who believes he is Socrates. His concerned wife hires two actors of questionable talent to play his "disciples." Soon the wife and the man's own psychiatrist (Luciano De Cresenzo) are questioning their own sanity. Part two finds the 65 year old Carlotta (Caterina Boratto) as the attractive widow who acts like a teenager. When she falls in love, her conservative son Oscar (Renato Scarpa) and his wife try to stop her -- in fear she will spend their inheritance. The third story finds the impoverished Alphonso (Enzo Cannavale) wandering the street on New Years Eve hoping to buy fireworks for his young sons. He meets a learned astronomer who explains how the new year should really fall a week later. The happy Alphonso accepts the explanation and explodes a cherry bomb the following week, which leads to his arrest. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

Supposedly an adaptation of Emile Zola's novel, this movie is set in Paris in the 1880s. Remade three times after the original 1926 version, this is the story of a prostitute who takes Parisian society by storm. This is a classic tale of the rise and fall of one striving to climb the social ladder. Rife with heartbreak and desperation, the characters are somewhat stiff and even her fall from grace fails to involve the viewer. ~ Tana Hobart, Rovi

This well-handled giallo thriller was directed by Antonio Bido (Il Gatto dagli Occhi di Giada). After a young girl is murdered by a mysterious stranger, the young Stefano (Lino Capolicchio) comes home to Venice to visit his brother (Craig Hill), a priest with many enemies. As people start dying left and right, Bido introduces an odd assortment of characters, including a wife-killing doctor, an abortionist, and a nutty gay Count (Massimo Serato) who molests children. Stefano tries figuring out the mystery while having an affair with an interior decorator (Suspiria's Stefania Casini). It might be argued that the plot is merely a reworking of Lucio Fulci's superior Non se Sevizio un Paperino (1971), with shades of Capolicchio's previous starring turn in Pupi Avati's La Casa dalle Finestre che Ridono (1976), but in Italian genre film, the question of derivative plotlines becomes almost superficial. It works, and should please Euro-thriller fans. ~ Robert Firsching, Rovi

In this drama an Italian lawyer comes back home to a real surprise concealed in his closet. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

A young med student is doing his grad work at the local morgue when a series of mysterious and unexplained deaths (ascribed to suicide) surround her. The sudden influx of corpses is more than this fellow can handle. ~ Rovi

A married couple is haunted by a series of mysterious occurrences after the death of their young daughter in this enigmatic chiller. Based on a story by Daphne du Maurier, whose works inspired Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca and The Birds, the film centers on Laura and John Baxter (Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie), who have recently relocated to Venice so that John can oversee the architectural restoration of an old church. Both hope that the change of environment will allow them to forget the recent tragic demise of their child, but they instead find themselves surrounded by reminders of death, as the city attempts to deal with a series of unexplained murders. The eeriness intensifies when they encounter a blind psychic and her eccentric sister, who promise to contact her daughter's spirit. Laura embraces the idea, but John remains skeptical until he experiences his own visions: fleeting glimpses of someone in a red coat similar to one that belonged to his daughter. ~ Judd Blaise, Rovi

This drama tells the tale of union woes at a French factory, and of the single mom who gives her all for the union cause. Pierrette (Dominique Labourier) is the young mother, and she somehow has time to have an affair with her handsome co-worker who is nicknamed Beau Masque (Luigi Diberti). All this grows more complicated when the workers go out on strike. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

Peter Strauss, six years removed from his Rich Man Poor Man stardom, stars in the Italian-Spanish Man of Legend. Strauss plays a WW I-era German soldier, who barely escapes being wrongly executed as a spy. He escapes to the French Foreign Legion, then enjoys a torrid romance with Tina Aumont, daughter of a Moroccan rebel leader. Before he knows what hit him, Strauss has become a hero of the rebellion Man of Legend bears no relation to truth, but it goes down easily on a rainy afternoon. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Here the director adapts his own novel about Mira (Romy Schneider), a firebrand of a woman, who moves from being a ferocious labor organizer to being the mistress of her town's factory owner (Ugo Tognazzi). Labor negotiations provide a background for their brief but devastating romantic affair. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

This story from Alexander Dumas is updated to modern times and tinged with graphic nudity and eroticism. Marguerite (Daniele Gaubert) is the tart who sleeps her way up the social ladder to help Armand Duval (Nino Castelnuevo), a commoner who happens to be her boyfriend. The original story has Camille dying from tuberculosis, but in this version she suffers from an unknown ailment. She takes a variety of drugs and becomes a walking zombie (when she can stand up) in this expertly photographed sexploitation feature. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

Vittorio Gassman stars in this uneven blend of sex and comedy where animals attempt to take over the world. Satirical jabs are taken at the advertising, politics and heroes. Gassman plays a model who makes his career by appearing on billboards and loses a battle of wits with a gorilla in a zoo. Our hero watches a striptease through a telescope in Rome. He also witnesses a giant moth devouring the bathing suits of bikini-clad beauties. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

Award-winning Italian writer/director Mario Camerini, who successfully bucked the "neorealist" movement of the 1940s, continued operating in a strictly commercial vein with 1966's Delitto Quasi Perfetto. The plot is sheer gossamer, handled with artistry: a journalist, stumbling upon a plot to swindle an heiress, decides to turn the tables on the crooks. The leading lady is the delightful Graziella Granata, while the male contingent is well represented by Massimo Serato and Phillipe LeRoy. If you're not expecting The Bicycle Thief of La Dolce Vita, you're in for a good time. Evidently, Delitto Quasi Perfetto was never released to US theatres, though video versions are available. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Set in fourth century Italy, this sword and sandal adventure retells the story of Kurosawa's The Seven Samurai as it follows the exploits of two brothers who gather a gallant group of ex-galley slaves and sail off to the Middle East to enact the downfall of a tyrant. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi