Conchita Airoldi Movies

Closer co-stars Julia Roberts and Clive Owen reunite for Oscar-nominated director Tony Gilroy's drama tracing the illicit love affair between two spies-turned-corporate operatives. The Cold War has thawed, and for CIA agents seeking to make an easy mint, the real money is in multinational corporations. CIA officer Claire Stenwick (Roberts) and Ray Koval (Owen) are both racing to secure the formula for a product that will bring untold wealth to the company that lands the patent first as the stakes begin to rise, and their passions start to flare. Meanwhile, their mutual employers, industry giant Howerd Tully (Tom Wilkinson) and trailblazing CEO Dick Garsil (Paul Giamatti) start resorting to some seriously underhanded tactics in hope of gaining an advantage over the competition. Loners by definition of their own careers, Claire and Ray engage in a series of schemes and double-crosses while contending with the fact that their mutual attraction could ultimately jeopardize their entire missions. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Neglected by her husband and longing for companionship, lonely Hollywood actress Carole enters into a passionate affair with a photographer who has been assigned to capture her portrait. Filmmaker Philippe Garrel directs a drama starring Louis Garrel, Clémentine Poidatz, and Laura Smet. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

A fugitive from justice discovers he has to leave his principles behind to come out of the underground in this drama from Italy. Giorgio (Alessio Boni) was a member of a radical left-wing group who was forced to flee the country when a bomb he planted unexpectedly killed an innocent party. After living in Central America for several years, Giorgio has decided to return to Italy and turn himself in. Giorgio is enrolled in a program where he is "rehabilitated" by cooperating with the police, staring by getting the goods on Anedda (Michele Placido), a corrupt cop. However, before long Giorgio's actions start to seem more like blackmail than justice, as a demands payments from the owner of a topless bar and persuading a married woman, Flora (Isabella Ferrari), to sleep with him until her husband makes good on a long-standing debt. However, temptation becomes too much for Giorgio when Anedda offers to bring him in on a robbery he's been planning; Giorgio's share of the loot looks to be enough to keep him afloat for years, but his new criminal lifestyle is more than he knows how to handle. Arrivederci Amore (aka The Goodbye Kiss) was adapted from a novel by Massimo Carlotto. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Arriving on the eponymous Sicilian island with his wife and child to investigate the murder of a would-be informant, FBI agent Matt Benson (Harvey Keitel) attempts to contact the only person who knows the truth behind the killing - the dead man's eleven-year-old son. As Benson races to reach the boy before the mafia, it's only a matter of time before the endangered boy meets the same fate as his father. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

One of William Shakespeare's lesser-known plays, Titus Andronicus was staged in New York by award-winning theatrical director Julie Taymor in an acclaimed 1995 production, before her widely praised Broadway version of The Lion King. Taymor revisits that production for her first motion picture, with the addition of a star-studded cast. Roman General Titus Andronicus (Anthony Hopkins) has returned from defeating the Goths in a bloody battle, but the victory has left him with mixed feelings, as the war took the lives of several of his sons. Titus is reminded by his first-born son Lucius (Angus Macfadyen) that their faith demands the sacrifice of an enemy prisoner as a gift to the gods for their victory. Titus chooses the eldest son of Tamora (Jessica Lange), the Queen of the Goths, who has since been taken hostage by Titus's troops. Tamora pleads for her son's life, but Titus goes ahead with the sacrifice. She then becomes the lover of the new emperor of Rome, Saturninus (Alan Cumming), a weak-willed and corrupt man. Tamora uses her connection to the throne for her own ends: in retaliation for the death of her son, Tamora and her surviving sons, Chiron (Jonathan Rhys Myers) and Demetrius (Matthew Rhys), brutally rape Titus's beloved daughter, Lavinia (Laura Fraser). This act sets in motion an ever-tightening spiral of revenge and retaliation that leaves few of the participants unscathed. The supporting cast includes Colm Feore as Marcus, Harry Lennix as Aaron, and James Frain as Bassianus. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

In this Italian drama an astrophysicist returns to his birthplace and re-discovers his humanity. Lorenzo needs money. He stops his research in Milan and goes to his former childhood villa in Sicily to sell it. Because workers are renovating it, he must linger longer than he wanted. He begins to remember the slower pace of Sicilians as compared to the hustle of mainland urban Italy. He slowly becomes friends with Salvatore, the head repairman. He lives in an alternative-therapy community for mental patients. His son Agostino is a patient there. Salvatore's simple philosophies have a cathartic effect upon Lorenzo who begins to view the handyman as a father figure. When Lorenzo was younger his own father died. As a result, Lorenzo left Sicily. The research also finds healing in his relationship to Luisa, another patient to whom is drawn. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Achingly romantic and creepy-funny, this funereal fantasy from the director of La Chiesa (1989) is unlike any Italian film in memory. Rupert Everett plays Francesco Dellamorte, a lonely cemetery caretaker who just wants to get out of his small town of Buffalora. His assistant and sole companion, Gnaghi (played by famed French musician Francois Hadji-Lazaro) is an overweight cretin who speaks only in grunts, and the dead people outside are rising from their graves as zombies and trying to have him for breakfast. This situation, coupled with all his other problems, gives Francesco a real complex. His troubles are compounded when he meets a series of mysterious women (all played by the beautiful Anna Falchi) whom he loves before they die tragically. Soavi's film is based on a graphic-novel, Dylan Dog by Tiziano Sclavi, but Soavi's more obvious influences range from Jean Rollin's La Rose de Fer (1973) to Tim Burton's Edward Scissorhands (1990). Barbara Cupisti (of Soavi's Deliria) has a small role, and the film also benefits from Manuel de Sica's memorable score and excellent pacing by editor Franco Fraticelli. This is a film to savor and it will go down as one of the most striking Italian genre efforts of the decade, despite some weak effects work by the normally reliable Sergio Stivaletti. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide

Set during the Mussolini years, Open Doors stars Gian Maria Volonte as an old-line judge. Volonte tries to remain faithful to the letter of the law, despite the "improvements" made by the Fascists. His insistence upon justice over dogma results in government reprimands, and ultimately poses a threat to Volonte's well-being. The honesty vs. corruption theme transcends the film's period settings, resulting in an allegorical masterpiece that has significance in any country, any time. Open Doors was a nominee for the "best foreign picture" Academy Award. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A simple man becomes bent on violent revenge in this thriller. John Kinsdale (George Kennedy) is an American who lives with his wife and three children in Naples, Italy, where he's employed by NATO as an electronics expert. Kinsdale and his good friend Mike McAllister (John Mills) are working to bring NATO's computer systems up to date, but Kinsdale loses all interest in his work when he comes home one evening to discover his wife and kids have been brutally murdered in their home. Emotionally devastated, Kinsdale has no idea why his family has been killed until Italian investigator Dr. Lupo (Raf Vallone) learns the Kinsdales were murdered by a band of radical terrorists who are targeting the families of Americans living in Europe until their jailed comrades are released from prison. Using his computer skills, Kinsdale sets out to find the terrorists who claimed the lives of his family, and will stop at nothing to get the justice he demands. Featuring a score by Ennio Morricone, The Human Factor was the final directorial credit for veteran filmmaker Edward Dmytryk. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide