Nino Manfredi Movies

A hard-working Sicilian heads for Switzerland in search of a better life in this gentle, sweet-sour Italian comedy. Despite the poor fellow's best efforts to fit in with his neighbors, he never quite seems to make it. Of course his tragedy is the audience's delight. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

This curious film attempts to mix suspense and comedy as it details the efforts of Mussolini's Italy to deal with the public outcry over a series of child sex murders. "Il Duce" must find someone to serve as a plausible culprit in order to restore public order and calm fears. While Girolomoni (Nino Manfredi), who is innocent of the crime, is released after only a year in prison, he returns without having his name exonerated and is an outcast in society; his name has become a byword for child sex crimes. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

This Italian movie is as much a love song to a place as a story. The place is the bohemian quarter in Rome known as the Trastevere. It is been compared to the Left Bank in Paris. This film features highly professional actors, a colorful setting, and very salty Italian dialogue. Actor/director Fausto Tozzi takes a tour of the neighborhood and its inhabitants in a series of colorful vignettes. Traveling between the Tiber river and the hill called Gianicolo, Vittorio De Sica searches for a lost pet, encountering along the way the difficulties faced by a gay nobleman, a suicidal American, the local prostitutes, and the intrigues and gossip that pass back and forth in a small square. The main dramatic issue seems to be how the slightly more conservative locals are dealing with an onslaught of hippie tourists. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

This three-part social satire lampoons the church, television, big business and universities plagued by campus unrest. Riccardo (Vittorio Gassman) is a rebel who causes confusion on campus and at a television station. Part two finds industrial magnate Cavazza (Michel Simon) hounding his subordinate Franco (Nino Manfredi) when the two travel to New York. Franco abandons his boss on Fifth Avenue, where he is arrested for using a phone booth as a toilet. Cavazza gets revenge when both are back in Italy. In part three, Don Giuseppe (Alberto Sordi) is a priest who defends himself against allegations of an illicit affair with a local cashier. After an audience with the bishop, the once-quiet priest demands a car, a wife, and another flock to lead. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

Fausto (Alberto Sordi) heads into the African jungle to find his long-lost cousin in this slapstick comedy. The Italian gentleman and his personal secretary Ubaldo (Bernard Blier) search for Oreste (Nino Manfredi) with orders to write a story about the man. Comedy ensues as they make their way through the sweltering jungle to locate Oreste, who is found to be the leader of a local native tribe. Fausto tries to convince his cousin to return to civilization and leave behind the primitive paradise of a carefree existence with his choice of many beautiful women. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

A romance between a young woman factory worker and a barber is stopped when her parents raise protests over her relationship with the man. When rumors of the romance run rampant in the small town, she leaves for Rome. She takes a job as an assistant to a deaf-mute tailor and eventually accepts his proposal of marriage. The barber attempts suicide and is hospitalized. His depression is cured when he wins the lottery and he travels to Rome to reclaim his old love. They rekindle their romance and plan the demise of her husband by planting a bomb in the stove. The explosion miraculously restores the hearing and speech of the intended victim. The miracle prompts the husband to enter a monastery and help those with the disabilities that he himself overcame in the explosion. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

In this comedy, a lovely woman lives and loves freely. Her many lovers do not mind and all are happy until one of the men gets possessive and knocks her around. As the woman recovers in the hospital, her physician suggest she try monogamy for a while. She does, but it is not as much fun and so returns to her freewheeling ways. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Made in Italy is a multistoried film, set...in Italy, of course. An all-star cast appears in brief seriocomic vignettes about rich and poor, tourist and native. Director Nanni Loy exhibits the realistic and somewhat earthy technique he'd used on his earlier documentaries, with heavy emphasis on ironic punch lines. Filmed in 1965 by a Franco/Italian production team, Made in Italy received the best possible exposure upon its 1967 American release when clips were showcased on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show. Best bit: The "give to the poor" poster in an impoverished Italian mountain village. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

High-seas battles between a confiscated Italian steamer and British subs during WW II. ~ Tana Hobart, All Movie Guide

The business of death provides the framework for this black comedy about a mortician's assistant who wants to marry an executioner's daughter. Her father really wants to change professions, but cannot, as he will lose his new government-sponsored apartment. The young man is persuaded to take over the job, but he swears he will quit before he must kill someone. Unfortunately, an execution is scheduled shortly before the beginning of a major carnival, a time when many executions are halted. The bride and groom travel there, hoping the victim will be pardoned, but he is not and the groom must fulfill his duty. Although he swears he will never do another, his face tells another story, and the old executioner knows that many more state-sanctioned deaths will follow. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Four different facets of love Italian-style provide the basis of this episodic film. The vignettes are "The Phone," about a woman so busy talking on the phone that she fails to notice that her husband is having sex with a neighbor; "Treatise on Eugenics," the chronicle of a Swedish girl's search for the perfect sire; "The Soup," about a wife's attempts to get rid of her husband's corpse; and "Monsignor Cupid," which follows the attempts of a concierge to seduce a handsome young man. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In this comedy anthology, the sex-capades of several Italian couples are chronicled. In "The Scandal," a dull and insensitive husband is unaware that his lonely wife has been flirting with a young buck at a vacation resort. When the husband finally finds out, he gets jealous and the marriage is renewed. In "Sin in the Afternoon," a movie producer is frustrated because his wife refuses to touch him, and so he winds up picking up a comely woman off the street and taking her to a motel. "The Victim" chronicles the relationship between an insanely jealousy woman and her beleaguered husband, whom she drives away. She, seeking revenge, begins an affair with his best friend. In the final episode, "Modern People," a deeply indebted cheese maker is given the option of paying the debt in cash or allowing the debtor an evening of lovemaking with his gorgeous wife. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide