The Great Beauty

86th Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Winner
The Great Beauty (La grande bellezza)
2013
Italy
Color
Directed by Paolo Sorrentino

Plot: Jep Gambardella has seduced his way through the lavish nightlife of Rome for decades, but after his 65th birthday and a shock from the past, Jep looks past the nightclubs and parties to find a timeless landscape of absurd, exquisite beauty.

Theme: Comedy, Drama

Links: imdb | Wikipedia

Poster:

Cinema Paradiso

62nd Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Winner
Cinema Paradiso (Nuovo cinema Paradiso)
1989
Italy
Color
Directed by Giuseppe Tornatore

Plot: A filmmaker recalls his childhood, when he fell in love with the movies at his village's theater and formed a deep friendship with the theater's projectionist.

Theme: Movie Making, Friendship

Links: imdb | Wikipedia

Poster:

Mediterraneo

64th Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Winner
Mediterraneo
1991
Italy
Color
Directed by Gabriele Salvatores

Plot: A comedy about stereotypical Italian soldiers. Draftees almost to a man, they are inefficient, clumsy, romantics and dreamers. They are sent to guard the least strategic island in WWII. Where are the enemy? Not here, just an island of women and children. Rapidly their radio is broken and weapons stolen, what can they do but join in the local culture. They have everything an Italian soldier could want; drink, drugs, prostitutes, sun, sand and sea. What can they do but relax and wait for the war to end. (Written by Matthew Stanfield)

Theme: WWII, Comedy

Links: imdb | Wikipedia

Poster:

Don't Tell

78th Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Nominee
Don't Tell (La bestia nel cuore)
2005
Italy
Color
Directed by Cristina Comencini

Plot: Sabina has a regular life. She is satisfied with her job and her love for Franco. Lately nightmares start disturbing her, and almost in the same time she discovers to be pregnant. Step by step she remembers her childhood spent within a severe middle-class family. But a big secret is hidden within her heart. Sabina wants to contact again her brother, a University teacher in the US, to try to understand what is happened in their past. What is the secret? She is determined to bring clarity and serenity in her life. She finally manages to free herself from her "beast inside the heart". (Written by 1felco)

Theme: Family secret

Links: imdb | Wikipedia

Poster:

Life Is Beautiful

71st Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film Winner
Life Is Beautiful (La vita è bella)
1998
Italy
Color
Directed by Roberto Benigni

Plot: A Jewish man has a wonderful romance with the help of his humour, but must use that same quality to protect his son in a Nazi death camp.

Theme: WWII, Nazi

Links: imdb | Wikipedia

Poster: