Gastone Renzelli Movies
Young Mario (Giancarlo Damiani) loses his mother, Ada (Giulia Rubini), when she's hit by a truck, and so his father, Aldo (Gastone Renzelli), a mechanic, must leave his job in Kenya and return to Italy. The father and son have nothing in common, and Mario shies away from him. Aldo must return to Africa and so puts his son in an orphanage, but the boy escapes on the eve of his father's departure and takes refuge with his friend Richetto (Pierre Trabaud). Aldo finds Mario, and Richetto explains that he had been only a helping friend to Ada -- and that, as a woman alone in the city with a child, she needed help. He urges Aldo to be there for the son who needs him, and Aldo decides not to go back to Kenya but to stay and raise Mario. ~ Nicole Gagne, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Giulia Rubini, Gastone Renzelli, (more)
Directly after his successful The Gold of Naples (1954), Italian filmmaker Vittorio DeSica served up something of a throwback to his neorealist days. In The Roof (originally Il Tetto) a pair of young lovers wed in defiance of their families' wishes. With the confidence of youth, they decide to set up housekeeping for themselves. Alas, they soon learn that living on love is a virtually impossibility-especially in a postwar economy. The box-office failure of The Roof was a major setback for DeSica's directorial career: he would not be able to finance another film until 1960's Two Women. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gabriella Pallotta, Giorgio Listuzzi, (more)
Director Michelangelo Antonioni's unique triptych film features three murders, one taking place in Paris, another in Rome, and another in London. All of the perpetrators are affluent youths, each killing for his own dubious motive. In the France segment, a group of adolescents kill for money, even though they don't need it; in the London segment, a poet uncovers a woman's body and tries to profit from the discovery; and in the Italian segment, a student becomes caught up in a smuggling ring, with deadly results. Though each crime is investigated, the guilty are rarely singled out for their actions. I Vinti had a protracted production schedule, due in large part to the director's inability to find funding for such ambitious, resolutely downbeat material. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide
This early Luchno Visconti drama stars Anna Magnani as an overbearing stage mother. Magnani's daughter (Tina Apicella) has zero talent, but Magnani raises such a ruckus at the studio after the girl's abortive screen test that the producers eventually find work for the girl. By this point, Magnani has renounced show business and, with daughter in tow, returns to her patient husband, who has been waiting for his wife to get her dreams of vicarious stardom out of her system. Based on a story by famed Italian scenarist (and frequent Fellini collaborator) Cesar Zavattini, Bellissima seems too trivial a story to be given the tender loving care provided by Visconti. Originally released at 130 minutes, the film was honed down to 90 minutes for American consumption. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Anna Magnani, Walter Chiari, (more)








