Luca Barbareschi Movies

He was a poor carpenter who never traveled further than 50 miles from his home and died at the age of 33, but his teachings changed the world and he's still followed by hundreds of millions of people around the world, 2,000 years after his death. Jesus, originally produced as a television mini-series, offers a glimpse of the human side of the messiah, as well as recounting the story of his life and martyrdom. Jeremy Sisto stars as Jesus, with Jacqueline Bisset as Mary, Armin Mueller-Stahl as Joseph, Gary Oldman as Pontius Pilate, and Debra Messing as Mary Magdalene. The home video release is expanded from the broadcast edition, featuring material that was cut for time purposes. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

The English title of this complex Italian film is apt. Featuring 65 main characters and 130 speaking parts (famous faces abound and many of the actors appeared gratis), and ranging in tone from tartly humorous to darkly tragic, it presents 30 interwoven slices from the lives of modern day Romans during a single day. The lone, silent figure of a lone jogger provides a sort of continuity between the vignettes. Beginning at sunset of the previous day, the jogger is seen warming up on his apartment terrace, looking for all the world as if he would like to jump. The rest of the stories seem to be randomly presented. Stories include the robbery of a Chinese restaurant that causes a birthday celebrant to die of fright, two different newlyweds who find themselves attracted to each other, an opportunistic mechanic's plan to capitalize on the death of a rival, a sneaky, sadistic meter maid and others. One uniting feature of the stories is their underlying bitter assessment of modern humanity. People are seen as selfish and basically cruel, still the stories move quickly and the balance between humor and drama, affection and cynicism, and shallowness and complexity is carefully maintained. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Nastassja Kinski headlines this Italian romantic-tragedy which tells the story of a lonely man and a mysterious blonde amnesiac. The film is set in Milan. Tommaso has a slight physical disability and is very shy. One night upon returning home, he accidently hits a beautiful blonde woman who falls onto his doorstep with amnesia. At first Tommaso does not welcome her intrusion into his life, but then slowly, comes to love her. Unfortunately her memory returns and she returns to her previous life as the lover of Alberto, an aspiring major drug dealer. He is getting ready to field a major coke deal, but the blonde has other plans for Alberto. Tommaso pursues her and refuses to accept her rejection of him. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Two factory workers from a Tunis plant have been waylaid by bandits while riding the bus back to their home. One of them is Italian, the other a local Tunisian Arab, and they are friends. The Tunisian was wounded in the incident, and as they wait to be discovered by someone who might help them, he tells the Italian man a strange story. Some years ago, just as he was getting married, the Arab man got into a fight with a magician. The magician cut off four of the bride's fingers, which were lost in the sands, and the woman died. Her mother believed that the fingers were the key to bringing her back to life and sent the groom into the desert to find them. At the time of the story, he had found three of the four fingers, but then he dies. The story jumps into the future, and the Italian man has adopted the dress and customs of his Tunisian hosts. He discovers the fourth finger in an antique shop and goes to take it to the girl's mother. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

After a couple decides to part ways and begin seeing other people, the ex-husband still desires his ex-wife and attempts to get her back in this comedy (featuring bikinied Nielsen and Alt). ~ Kristie Hassen, All Movie Guide

In this Italian romantic drama the beautiful mistress of an internationally recognized surgeon becomes insanely jealous when he suddenly takes up with a young swimming teacher. Soon she begins engineering elaborate plots to get him back. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In this uninspired drama, Teresa (Serena Grandi) considers marriage to a wealthy German baron. She agrees to marry him but has reservations when she walks to the altar. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

In this understated drama by director and co-writer Pupi Avati, the life-changing events that sweep through an office of nondescript bank workers may be minor in the scheme of a greater cosmos, but they have a major impact on everyone involved. The story is told through the eyes of Luigi (Claudio Botosso), just out of college and starting work at the bank as a new recruit. Luigi is shy enough to seem aloof at the beginning, but he quickly gets into the rhythm of office politics, at least as much as his still-reserved personality allows. Luigi would like to go out with Annalisa (Elena Sofia Ricci) but the attractive woman has chosen his former roommate Dario (Dario Parisini) instead. Meanwhile, Luigi is getting an introduction into the small and often corrupt and profligate society around him; women seem willing to bed down with whomever -- though not with him -- and they even get drunk at parties. Older men are chasing women who are their employees, the haves are not interested in associating with the have-nots, and even the rich cannot always get into -- and stay in -- the clubs that define an elite strata. As relationships come and go, one of the more unscrupulous workers is finally discharged, but not before a scandal erupts. And tragedy also lies waiting in the wings -- leaving Luigi with a lot of life experience in a very brief period of time. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

With a curious mix of classical and rock music and the literary and performing worlds, director Valerio Zecca has ostensibly focused on two disparate roommates and their desire for the same woman while providing a picture of self-absorbed youth with no long-term personal or professional goals and no broad view of life. Carlo (Luca Barbareschi) attends a music school part of the time, and the rest of the time he plays gigs with his rock band and chases after women. His roommate Paolo, the introverted literary owner of a bookstore, is plagued by strong feelings especially for Lili (Marilu Prati), an aspiring, avant-garde actress who is also on Carlo's most wanted list. The superficial Lili is attracted to both roommates and just cannot make up her mind -- until fate intervenes. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In this political drama, Hannah Kaufman, a Jewish-American attorney, must defend Selim Bakri, a young Palestinian suing Israel for the right to live on his Left Bank ancestral land. The government's lawyer, a cocky Israeli attorney, is Hannah's lover and the father of her unborn child. Conflict ensues when Hannah and Selim also become lovers. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

While Umberto Lenzi began the Italian-made cycle of brutal Amazonian cannibal horrors with Il Paese del Sesso Selvaggio and effectively ended it with the nauseating Cannibal Ferox, it was Ruggero Deodato who directed the subgenre's most enduring film. This popular bloodbath features a fetus ripped from a woman's body, people impaled on spikes, a genuine tortoise-flaying, and numerous other indignities, both real and simulated. The plot concerns the efforts of a group of American explorers to discover the fate of a missing documentary film crew. They receive a scratchy film-reel containing the bloody truth from a tribe of tree-dwelling natives, and the reel's contents make up the bulk of the film. Advertisements claimed that "the crew who filmed it were actually devoured alive by cannibals," yet most of them were spotted alive in future unsavory gore films. While the film is undoubtedly gruesome enough to satisfy fans, its mixture of nauseating mondo animal slaughter, repulsive sexual violence, and pie-faced attempts at socially conscious moralizing make it rather distasteful morally as well. The fact that the film's sole spokesperson for the anti-exploitation perspective is played by porno star Richard Bolla should give an indication of where its sympathies lie. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide