Sandra Ceccarelli Movies

The true story of a giant of Croatian literature is brought to the screen in this epic-scale costume drama from filmmaker Veljko Bulajic. Marin Drzic (Sven Medvesek) is a popular playwright and essayist in 16th Century Dubrovnik, well known using a poison pen to poke fun at the nation's political leaders. Drzic's theater pieces always draw a large and appreciative audience, and he has a powerful supporter in Lord Zamanja (Radko Polic), but Luka (Goran Grgic), the state's official censor, takes a very dim view of his political humor. Luka takes it upon himself to silence Drzic and his supporters, shutting down his theater and using violence to quell Zamanja and his cronies. Countess Desa (Sandra Ceccarelli), Zamanja's daughter and Drzic's love, urges the writer to leave Dubrovnik and seek exile in Italy; however, Drzic is reluctant to leave the land he loves, and when he finally listens to reason, Luka has sent strong-arm men to Florence to prevent the expatriate from living in peace. Desa tries to persuade Cosimo de Medici (Andrea Buscemi) to come to Drzic's defense, but this fails, and Drzic makes a final desperate bid to find asylum in Venice. Libertas received its North American premiere at the 2007 Palm Beach International Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Raúl Ruiz's Klimt uses an amorphous, nonchronological narrative to cinematize events from the life of one of the 20th century's most profound artists: the Austrian painter Gustav Klimt (here portrayed by John Malkovich). Ruiz begins with Klimt's painful death from syphilis, and spends the remainder of the film transitioning, loosely and freely, between episodes that befell the painter. The film pays particularly strong attention to the artist's proclivity for scandalizing the European upper crust with overtly erotic subject matter and presentation, and his many affairs -- notably a lengthy one with his perpetual inspiration, Lea de Castro (Saffron Burrows). Throughout Klimt's life, a figure known as the Secretary (Stephen Dillane) comes and goes, who is actually a product of his fevered imagination -- and with whom the painter debates continually about the function of art in contemporary Western civilization, and the relevance of the artist. This enables Ruiz to create both a biographical sketch and a philosophical treatise. Visually, Ruiz and director of photography Ricardo Aronovich make the ambitious decision to recreate Klimt's style of painting on a cinematographic plane.

Unfortunately, difficulty befell this picture from the beginning, when the director (for some unascertainable reason) opted to draft the initial script in French, have it translated into German, and then have the German draft translated into English and revised by author Gilbert Adair -- rendering the dialogue stilted and unconvincing. Complications also arose on the distribution end. Still infuriated by the distributive mutilation that befell his previous film, the whopping Time Regained (and doubtless concerned that this might happen again), Ruiz pliantly struck a bargain with distributors for Klimt. He trimmed his original, 135-minute "director's cut" down to a 96-minute "producer's cut" for general consumption, which rendered much of the material less fluid and coherent. Both versions screened at the 2006 Rotterdam Film Festival. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

Giuseppe Piccioni follows up on his 1999 opus Not of this World with this understated drama about fantasy and reality. The film centers on Antonio (Luigi Lo Cascio), a youngish chauffeur who is a model of professional promptness and courtesy. He also possesses a vivid inner world dominated by images of other worlds and other planets. A chance near-accident introduces him to Maria (Sandra Ceccarelli), a struggling single mother trying desperately to keep her frozen foods store afloat and to keep her daughter from being taken away from her by the child's grasping grandparents. Even though Maria is extremely suspicious of Antonio's intentions, the two form a slow tentative relationship. When he learns Maria's dire circumstances, he selflessly tries to intercede at the expense of his own career. Antonio makes quiet deals with the sleazy gangster (Silvio Orlando) to whom Maria owes money, drives the crime boss around on his various errands, and eventually participates in some of his shady dealings. This film was screened at the 2001 Toronto and Venice Film Festivals. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

Sandra Ceccarelli plays three different women in three separate decades in this three-part anthology drama. In the opening segment, set in the 1940s, Stella (Ceccarelli) is a woman who, after years of working on other people's property, hopes to soon have enough money to buy farmland of her own. However, Stella's dreams are dashed when she learns she's pregnant. In the mid-'70s, Sonia (Ceccarelli) is a woman soon to marry the man she loves. But while Sonia values her career, her fiancé insists that if they wed, she must become a stay-at-home wife (except for occasionally helping out with the family business). And in the 1990s, Silvia (Ceccarelli) is a woman caught in a divisive labor dispute that has left her and her husband on opposite sides of a contentious strike. Guardia Il Cielo: Stella, Sonia, Silvia marked the first solo directorial effort from filmmaker Piergiorgio Gay, who previously made Tre Storie in collaboration with Roberto San Pietro. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Giuseppe Bertolucci (younger brother of Bernardo Bertolucci) has created a movie unusual for its all-female cast of well-known Italian actresses and for a script that gives them latitude to develop their individual characters. The story is about Laura (Lina Sastri) a young terrorist who commits a rash act of cold-blooded murder which introduces the other women in this story. Laura is in Venice when she kills a judge and a gang member who was vacillating in his commitment. The dead terrorist's mother (Rosanna Podesta) and sister (Giulia Boschi) attend his funeral in Avellino, an area devastated after a severe earthquake -- a particularly dramatic backdrop for a funeral. Back home, Laura's former nanny (Alida Valli) still lives with the family and is as astute as ever -- she figures out what Laura has done and leaves for good. Laura's mother (Lea Massari) is not as perceptive about her own daughter and can hardly believe Laura has done anything wrong, even after the police come to take her away. The effect this has on the devoted mother is totally devastating. Meanwhile, Laura is brought before a judge (Mariangela Melato) for questioning, made all the more difficult because of her critical emotional state and the judge's own personal problems. The wisdom of Laura's confession and the many "secrets" she reveals is another matter entirely. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide