Guido Alberti Movies

The loves and lives of three sisters provides the basis of this melodrama. The eldest is intelligent and very aware of life's ticking clock. The middle sister lives on emotions, while the youngest is an idealistic, impassioned pre-med student. The story is loosely based on Chekhov's play Three Sisters. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Filmmaker Jean-Jacques Beineix followed up the surprise international success of his first feature, Diva, with this stylish but downbeat drama. Gerard (Gerard Depardieu) is a dock worker who becomes an emotional wreck following the rape and suicide of his sister. As his relationships with his girlfriend Bella (Victoria Abril), his drunken brother, and his depressive father begin to decay, Gerard becomes obsessed with finding the man who attacked his sister and spends most of his nights lurking about the scene of the crime. In time, Gerard makes the acquaintance of Loretta (Nastassja Kinski), who cruises by the waterfront every evening in a red sports car. Desperate to pull himself out of his emotional doldrums, Gerard becomes involved with Loretta. Bella, however, is not at all happy about this, and she convinces a pair of strong-arm men to teach him a lesson. Gerard must now decide if he wants to be with Loretta or Bella, just as he's discovered evidence that may reveal who raped his sister. La Lune Dans Le Caniveau received uneven reviews on its initial release and won a French Cesar Award for its production design. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Starring Al Pacino and directed by Sydney Pollack, Bobby Deerfield stars Pacino plays the title character, a reckless race car driver. As his fame grows, Bobby becomes increasingly full of himself, which seriously jeopardizes his performance on the track and his private life. Marthe Keller plays Bobby's aristocratic, enigmatic lady friend, whose tragic secret sets the stage for melodrama. Also on hand is Ann Duperey as a racetrack groupie. Originally released at 124 minutes, Bobby Deerfield was pared down to 99 minutes by director Pollack for cable-TV consumption. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Directed by Umberto Lenzi, Spasmo centers on a discovery made by Christian (Robert Hoffman) and his girlfriend on what was meant to be a romantic stroll. At first, the couple happens on what appears to be a corpse, but upon further inspection, they see that the woman is still alive. As luck would have it, Christian meets the strange woman (Suzy Kendall) on a yacht party several days later, and quickly finds himself tangled in an affair. During a hotel room tryst, another man breaks in and savagely beats Christian. Quite accidentally, Christian ends up shooting the intruder with his own gun. In what is perhaps the most bizarre twist of events thus far, the body disappears, leaving Christian in the middle of yet another mystery. ~ Tracie Cooper, All Movie Guide

In this French psychological drama, a bank robber is finally released after serving 10 years. His being paroled is due to the influence of his old friend, a social worker. The ex-convict returns to his wife and begins living an honest life. Unfortunately, his old crook friends begin trying to lure him back to crime. Following a prison riot, the social worker ends up living in the same town as the ex-con. They become close friends until the ex-con's wife is killed during an accident. He finds a new wife, but their happiness is marred by the cop who keeps harassing him. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A Mafia hitman's decision to leave his profession results in bloodshed and tragedy. The violence begins when his bosses, to help him change his mind, have the assassin's wife and child brutally murdered, causing the hitman to launch a vendetta against his bosses. The film is also titled Big Guns. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Luigi Bazzoni (Le Orme) directed this outstanding giallo thriller starring Franco Nero as a hard-drinking newspaperman who gets involved in a string of brutal murders. After he investigates the first, he becomes a suspect himself but eventually manages to unravel a complex plot involving blackmail, adultery, and private sex shows. Wolfgang Preiss plays a creepy doctor, and Edmund Purdom is around as well. The impressive score is by Ennio Morricone, and the film looks great thanks to cinematographer Vittorio Storaro, on his way to his triumph with Last Tango in Paris. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide

This focus of this unassuming war movie is the Italian youth whose loyalties are divided in the wake of the political turmoil that has fomented World War II. In particular, three provincial teens gravitate away from their close circle of friends to become thoroughly disillusioned by the present state of society. One young man joins the underground to fight fascism, while his sister falls in love with a veteran Italian pilot from the Spanish Civil War. After a heartbreaking series of events, she returns to the arms of the man who has always loved her, a childhood sweetheart. He is a young rebel who becomes alienated from his family and friends when he also takes a stand against the fascist regime. Flashbacks are used to give historical perspectives for the characters, a technique that occasionally leads to viewer confusion. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

In this 1968 Italian production, Francesco Maselli directs this light-hearted and fast-paced caper comedy with Rock Hudson as New York City police captain Mike Harmon, who becomes involved with sex bomb Esmeralda Marini (Claudia Cardinale). Esmeralda, using the ploy that Harmon was an old friend of her father, convinces him to help her return some hot jewels to their former owners. Soon enough, Harmon and Esmeralda are jetting to Austria, where Harmon disables the victims' home-security system and sneaks the jewels back into their rightful place. But Esmeralda has tricked Harmon into replacing the real gems with fake ones, and now Harmon is a jet-set thief along with Esmeralda. Harmon, having gotten a taste of criminal high life, wants to split fifty-fifty with Esmeralda on the next heist. Esmeralda, however, wants to call it quits and get married. Harmon, doesn't see it that way, and Esmeralda, a one-man woman all the way, follows him as he heads off to his next nefarious adventure. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

An alcoholic gangster joins up with a band of notorious gun runners after he is devastated by the death of his mistress in a car crash. A little girl manages to help him have a change of heart as he foils the plans of the gang. The story is taken from a gangster novel by William P. McGivern. Technical aspects are good, but the film lacks the intensity of the original text. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

Stuck in a dream world of his own, Italian sculptor Albert Saporito (Marcello Mastroianni) sometimes has difficulty separating truth from fiction. When he dreams that his gangster neighbor has been murdered, he reports the crime to the police, only to involve himself in a complicated situation. This film is in Italian with English subtitles. ~ Iotis Erlewine, All Movie Guide

Marcello Mastroianni portrays the handsome lover Casanova pitted against a thoroughly modern woman. This is a legendary hero often depicted in movies, but this time he is portrayed with a slightly different problem - the only time he's "in the mood" is when he feels that he is in danger. His job as NATO officer offers plenty of opportunity for his sexual arousal problems to be assuaged. ~ Tana Hobart, All Movie Guide