Kolossal - The Magnificent Macisti

A behind-the-scenes documentary about director Michelangelo Antonioni as he's shooting his segment of The Three Faces, a vehicle for Soraya, the former empress of Persia. Featuring interviews with Monica Vitti, Tonino Guerra and more.

Cinecitta is today known as the center of the Italian film industry. But there is a dark past. The film city was solemnly inaugurated in 1937 by Mussolini. Here, propaganda films would be produced to strengthen the dictator's position.

Ferruccio Castronuovo was the only authorized eye, between 1976 and 1986, to film the brilliant Italian filmmaker Federico Fellini (1920-1993) in his personal and creative intimacy, to capture the gears of his great circus, his fantastic lies and his crazy inventions.

Herculane Baths, one of the oldest resorts in Europe, the place where, a few centuries ago, kings and queens were diving in the healing waters, became a maze where people get lost while looking for something better. Relu, Mitica and Gelu, three masseurs, are tour guides through the maze of an Eastern Europe garden of Eden.

A fantastic journey through the world of Renato Casaro, one of the most important illustrators that the world’s film poster industry has ever known.

The life of the legendary Italian photojournalist Paolo Di Paolo through his photographs, which capture the essence of a fascinating and turbulent Italy, the one inhabited by Anna Magnani and Pier Paolo Pasolini, a country that no longer exists.

A personal and captivating account of the extraordinary life and work of Ingrid Bergman (1915-82), a young Swedish woman who became one of the most celebrated actresses in world cinema.

The life and work of one of the great masters of Italian cinema, Sergio Leone (1929-89); a rich and fascinating portrait through unpublished testimonies of collaborators, actors, directors and critics who reconstruct every aspect of his creative activity.

Documentary on the filming of Novecento by Bernardo Bertolucci

The history of the peplum genre, known as sword-and-sandal cinema, set in Antiquity, from the silent film era to the present day.

A Place of Our Own

In the first century A.D. Carthago Nova is a splendid city of the Roman Empire. The Albino prosperous family is obliged to enter into competition with the mighty Lucio Andro to achieve the award of works. A conflict that will last for several years and that will worsen with the economic decline of the city and the popular revival of gladiatorial games.

Rome, Italy, June 1993. Antonietta De Lillo and Marcello Garofalo interview legendary Italian film director Lucio Fulci (1927-96).

Documentary about the lost 1914 film "Sperduti nel buio". Film historian Denis Lotto journeys across Europe following the trail of the lost movie.

Noble, wise King Sardanapolo and his more soft and naive younger brother Prince Sammash get into a bitter feud over the affections of sweet and alluring innocent peasant girl Mirra. Meanwhile, the treacherous and ruthlessly ambitious General Arbace plots against both siblings.

Four corrupted fascist libertines round up 9 teenage boys and girls and subject them to 120 days of sadistic physical, mental and sexual torture.

Don Fernando rallies peasants and townspeople to overthrow Moorish occupiers in medieval Spain.

Hercules is sent from Mount Olympus to modern-day Manhattan, where he takes up professional wrestling before getting mixed up with a gang of mobsters.

In year 1250 B.C. during the late Bronze age, two emerging nations begin to clash. Paris, the Trojan prince, convinces Helen, Queen of Sparta, to leave her husband Menelaus, and sail with him back to Troy. After Menelaus finds out that his wife was taken by the Trojans, he asks his brother Agamemnon to help him get her back. Agamemnon sees this as an opportunity for power. They set off with 1,000 ships holding 50,000 Greeks to Troy.

Bodybuilder Ed Fury stars as the legendary Ursus in this above-average sword-and-sandal adventure from veteran director Carlo Campogalliani. The plot concerns Ursus' attempts to rescue his kidnapped fiancee, aided by a pretty blind slave girl. Now an evil queen, Ursus' former love throws him into a gladiatorial arena with a bull, which manages to smack the slave girl in the head and restore her eyesight before Ursus defeats it and his enemies. The bullfight is particularly well-staged, and this exciting spectacle may be the highlight of Fury's erratic screen career. ~ Robert Firsching, Rovi