Teco Celio Movies

A moderately successful, thirtysomething rocker in dire need of a warm bed and a home-cooked meal returns to his family home in Rimini, only to be faced with a series of crises both large and small in this affectionate family comedy from director Gianni Zanasi. Stefano Nardini (Valerio Mastandrea) is a post-punk guitarist stuck in a strange career limbo; while he isn't exactly an unknown, he wouldn't be considered a household name by any means. When Stefano returns to his childhood home for a momentary reprieve from the rock & roll nightlife, his family welcomes him back with open arms. Unfortunately for Stefano, this retreat will be far from relaxing, since everyone under the roof seems locked into some sort of personal crisis. For starters, once-studious sister Michela (Anita Caprioli) has abandoned her education in favor of working with dolphins, and struggling mother Giuliana (Gisella Burinato) is taking self-help classes from a loopy guru who claims to hold the secrets to a happier life. On the more serious end of things, brother Alberto (Giuseppe Battiston) is locked into a bitter split with his ill-content wife -- a deeply personal woe that is only compounded by the fact that the family factory he runs has sunken deep into debt. When Alberto proves reluctant to divulge the sorry state of the family business to father Walter (Teco Celio), loyal siblings Stefano and Michela do their best to pitch in and set things right. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Unlike the more familiar animated Pinocchio by Disney, there are no song interludes here, and characters added to the story by Disney (such as Jiminy Cricket) are not included. Producer Francis Ford Coppola and director Steve Barron, (known for the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film) closely adhere to Carlo Collodi's 1883 novel and use the visually timeless setting of a Czechoslovakian village. Jim Henson's puppet studio skillfully brings this Pinocchio to life. Long ago, in his youth, Gepetto (Martin Landau) loved but did not court Leona (Genvieve Bujold), who married Gepetto's brother instead. In that earlier time, he carved her initials with his onto a tree. Now his brother is dead, and though he still feels for Leona, he is still too shy to woo her. Instead, the old puppet-maker goes into the forest and cuts down a tree in order to make a puppet just for himself. The tree is the same one he carved his initials into when he was younger, and it has the magic of his love in it. Soon after the puppet Pinocchio is made, he comes to life. Aside from being made of wood, he begins to live the life of a perfectly normal little boy. He even goes to school. Lorenzini, an evil magician who runs a children's puppet show, hears of Pinocchio and wants to use him in his show. Lorenzini lures children to his show, only to later turn them into donkeys. Donkeys are useful creatures, and Lorenzini makes a lot of money selling them. Through many trials and tribulations, the puppet-boy earns the right to become the human boy Pinocchio (Jonathan Taylor Thomas). ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Xavier Koller's fact-based drama chronicles the hardships suffered by a family of Turkish farmers who sell all of their worldly possessions in order to fund an escape to the greener pastures of Switzerland. En route, they fall prey to a group of smugglers, who direct them to access Switzerland via an illegal and dangerous mountain pass. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide

Cristophe (Michel Voita) is a reporter who is assigned to interview the prominent archaeologist Tober (Jean Bouise) in this combination fantasy drama. Tober has uncovered the coffin of the legendary 16t-century killer Jenatsch (Vittorio Mezzogiorno). After the interview, Cristophe begins to experience hallucinations that move from the present to the past with disturbing consequences. Soon his relationship with his sweetheart Nina (Christine Boisson) begins to suffer as Cristophe has visions of Jenatsch's murder. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

In a romp through American classics (like Rear Window) or some Woody Allen comedies, first-time director (and writer, producer, actor) G. Nicolas Hayek takes the audience on a cinematic rollercoaster ride. The story begins with an American pilot who returns to Switzerland as a guest of honor in a small village -- the pilot had crash-landed there in 1944. "Delighted to be back in the land of the legendary William Tell," he says, and then his hosts find an unexploded bomb on the site where a memorial is supposed to be raised. At that point, this entire sequence emerges as the imaginary scenario for a feature-length movie, still in the mind's eye of a young filmmaker (Ettore Cella). Giving up for a moment, he goes to work at the car-wash place that nearly provides him a living wage and is promptly involved as a hostage in a bank robbery. The robber is a woman (Agnes Dunneisen) who spirits him away as her protection and forces him to take her to his apartment. As the two hole up there, a nosy, wheelchair-bound neighbor spies on them from across the street. She does not miss much -- including where the robber stashed her loot -- and when it turns out that Hawaii is not really on the robber's itinerary after all, the nosy neighbor makes it over to the apartment to grab the money. After a few more unexpected twists and turns, the would-be filmmaker has enough material for a whole new feature.
~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Clothilde de Watteville (Lauren Hutton) is compared to "Hecate," a three-headed Greek fertility goddess and a protector of witches who came to be associated with Persphone and Hades. Clothilde/Hecate runs into Julien Rochelle (Bernard Giraudeau), a very young French diplomat in north Africa just before the outbreak of World War II and the two have a casual sexual encounter that leads to another such meeting, and another. His interest in her and his curiosity are heightened when she refuses to reveal any information about herself, and when she disappears for stretches at a time without any explanation. As his sexual passions increase at a par with his frustration at her behavior, he gives up trying to relate at all and walks out of the relationship. A few years later they meet at a diplomatic reception in Berne, the diplomat is older and perhaps wiser, but Clothilde's behavior is an inexplicable as ever. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide