A story of the love of Frou-Frou - an actress and singer in the in the beginning of her career.
While recuperating from their injuries in a hospital, three young women flash back to the events leading up to the catastrophe. Remata (Lia Amando) has spent her entire life trying to overcome a childhood rape. Annamaria (Antonella Lualdi) has recently come out of an unfortunate marriage to a wealthy but insensitive boor. And Gianna (Eleanore Rossi Drago), the daughter of a college professor, has ruined her life with narcotics.
Unlike most Italian films of the 1940s, Augusto Genina's Cielo Sulla Palude opened in Venice rather than Rome. The film's American title was Heaven Over the Marshes, and indeed most of the story is set in the disease-ridden Pontine Marshes on the outskirts of Rome. This was the home of Maria Goretti, a pious young girl who was murdered by her would-be seducer. For reasons elucidated in the course of the film, Maria's short time on earth made her worthy of Sainthood, which was actually bestowed upon her shortly after the release of this film. Maria Goretti is well-played by Ines Orsini. Cielo Sulla Palude served as the comeback feature for director Augusto Genina, whose previous pro-fascist films had caused him to be blacklisted after WW II.
The film is set in 1941 during the Second World War, when the city of Benghazi in Italian-ruled Libya was occupied by British forces. Italian inhabitants of Benghazi work to resist the British and discover their military plans. One man, Captain Enrico Berti, appears to be collaborating with the British but is in fact working undercover for Italian intelligence. The film ends with the city being recaptured by Italian troops and their Nazi German allies.
Lieutenant Mario Ludovici, an army officer, gets himself transferred to a Libyan post when his romance with society girl Cristiana goes on the rocks. Ludovici is looked upon as a weakling by Captain Santelia, the hard-boiled commander of the troops, but after a bitter campaign against a rebel tribe Ludovici proves his true worth and returns as commander when Santelia is mortally wounded. Cristiana arrives and tries to entice him to return to Rome, but he decides to stay in Africa with the army.
This rare 1935 film (the title translated means "do not forget me") features Beniamino Gigli as, of course, an Italian singer who warbles his way through a touching love story. Features musical selections from "Il Trovatore" and "Rigoletto" as well as a lullaby and some Neapolitan songs, including the title tune. Distributed by New York's Bel Canto Society (an organization of hard-core opera buffs).
In the spring of 1913, Jean Servin, a son of a family, became friends with Roberte, a little midinette. He leaves her a few months later to marry Cécile Breton. The years go by. Jean becomes an important businessman. One evening, he meets Roberte, who has become the wife of a wealthy American. She does not love her husband any more than he loves his wife. They recall their memories. They seem to still love each other. They plan to rebuild their lives. Together, they will spend a few days in Dieppe, as they did in the past after their first meeting. They feel so different from what they were twenty years ago that they understand that the past cannot live again.
A bank employee who stole money at work falls in the hands of a dangerous escaped convict whose girlfriend is going to help him out of this mess.
Lucienne, typist and gorgeous bathing beauty, decides to enter the 'Miss Europe' pageant sponsored by the French newspaper she works for. She finds her jealous lover Andre violently disapproves of such events and tries to withdraw, but it's too late; she's even then being named Miss France. The night Andre planned to propose to her, she's being whisked off to the Miss Europe finals in Spain, where admirers swarm around her. Win or lose, what will the harvest be?
Cyrano de Begerac is joyous, witty, a poet, a leader and filled with plenty of charisma and bravado in 17th Century France. He has only one flaw: an unusually long nose which makes him unattractive to any woman. Thus, he cannot have the woman he loves, his cousin Roxanne. Roxanne loves an officer in his army who gets tongue-tied in front of women. Who will Roxanne love? Will Cyrano ever find love? Or will he find happiness in helping the officer woo Roxanne? This is a story of split personalities, human frailty and unrequited love.
The young Augusto Genina directs this matrimonial comedy with verve, capturing the right tone and rythms. The Count and Countess Valmonte are a likeable and close-knit couple, but he spends too many evenings at his club, at least as far as she is concerned. Is there something behind these absences?
The 1912 Italian version of Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet.