Lina WertmüllerFilmography

Born:: August 14, 1928 in Rome, Italy
Occupation:: Director, Screenwriter
Birth name:: Arcangela Felice Assunta Wertmuller von Elgg
Biography:: The daughter of an aristocratic Swiss family, Lina Wertmuller harbored dreams of becoming a lawyer, but this notion fell by the wayside when she entered the Academy of Theatre in Rome in 1947. Thanks to a few valuable connections--one of her school chums was the wife of actor Marcello...Read More

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Marcello: A Sweet Life

Actors: Philippe Noiret, Ettore Scola, Armando Trovajoli, Chiara Mastroianni, Barbara Mastroianni

Synopsis: Marcello Mastroianni (1924-1996) was arguably the most famous and respected leading man in the history of Italian cinema. A favorite of such directors Federico Fellini, Luchino Visconti and Michelangelo Antonioni, Mastroianni's fame in Europe extended to the United States, where he was nominated Read More

2006
Too Much Romance... It's Time for Stuffed Peppers

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Sophia Loren, F. Murray Abraham, Angela Pagano, Elio Pandolfi, Armando Pugliese

2004
Swept Away

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Madonna, Adriano Giannini, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Bruce Greenwood, Elizabeth Banks

Synopsis: Guy Ritchie, best known for the tough-guy crime comedies Snatch and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, goes for a change of pace with this remake of Lina Wertmuller's 1974 comedy-drama, with his wife Madonna in tow. Amber Leighton (Madonna) is the wife of Dr. Anthony Leighton (Bruce Greenwood) Read More

10/11/02
Francesca e Nunziata

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Sophia Loren, Giancarlo Giannini, Claudia Gerini, Raoul Bova, Carmen Femiano

Synopsis: A mother who thinks of marriage in terms of business butts heads with a daughter who has her own unusual ideas about love in Lina Wertmuller's screen adaptation of Maria Orsini Natale's historical novel. Francesca (Sophia Loren) was a woman of common birth whose beauty and charm so entranced Read More

2001
Ferdinando e Carolina

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Sergio Assisi, Gabriella Pession, Silvana De Santis, Mario Scaccia, Isa Danieli

Synopsis: The life and times of Italy's King Ferdinand are played for laughs in this comic historical piece directed by Lina Wertmuller. Set in the 18th century, Ferdinando E Carolina opens with the aging Ferdinand falling ill and being taken to his bed, with his life story told in flashback. A naturally Read More

1999
Ninfa Plebea

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Synopsis: A ripe 19-year-old virgin fights to keep her virtue and retain her free-spirited ways during WW II. Set in an ancient, remote Neapolitan village, Miluzza is the lovely pubescent daughter of the glorious Nunziata, a nymphomaniac who is surprisingly well tolerated by her husband and her normally Read More

1996
Metalmeccanico e Parrucchiera in un Turbine di Sesso e Politica

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Synopsis: This Italian political satire from filmmaker Lina Wertmuller will be most enjoyable for those well-grounded in Italian politics. Covering the late March through April general elections of 1994 in which right-wing conservatives routed the incumbent leftists. This is particularly upsetting for Read More

1/1/96
Ciao, Professore!

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Paolo Villaggio, Ciro Esposito, Isa Danieli, Gigio Morra, Sergio Solli, Esterina Carloni

Synopsis: Lina Wertmuller's Ciao Professore was released in Italy as Il Speriamo che me la Cavo. Paolo Villago plays an urbane, supercillious schoolteacher who hopes to be assigned to an upper-crust district. Instead, a bureaucratic snafu ships Villago to the impoverished town of Corzano. Of the fifteen Read More

1993
Sabato, domenica e lunedì

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Sophia Loren, Luca DeFilippo, Alessandra Mussolini

Synopsis: In this domestic comedy, Rosa (Sophia Loren), a mature mother of several children, is concerned that her beloved husband Don Peppino (Luca de Filippo) is losing interest in her, and does his best to provoke some jealousy in him. She is a masterful cook, and if her romantic charms are fading, her Read More

1990
In Una Notte Di Chiaro Di Luna

Crew: Director

Actors: Rutger Hauer, Nastassja Kinski, Peter O'Toole, Faye Dunaway

Synopsis: This international production by well-known director Lina Wertmuller is a harrowing educational melodrama about the AIDS epidemic. The story follows John Knot (Rutger Hauer) a brash, cheerful American reporter, and Joelle (Nastassja Kinski), a new photographer he has had an affair with and Read More

9/5/89
Il Decimo Clandestino

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Dominique Sanda, Hartmut Becker

Synopsis: Originally titled simply Decimo Clandestino, this Lina Wertmuller "miniature" began life as an Italian TV drama. Piera Degli Esposti plays the widowed, impoverished mother of a huge farm family. The woman moves her nine children to Bologna, where their living conditions are deplorable. To avoid a Read More

1989
Notte d'Estate Con Profilo Greco, Occhi a Mandorla, e Odore di Basilico

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Mariangela Melato, Michele Placido, Roberto Herlitzka, Massimo Wertmuller

Synopsis: Mariangela Melato plays a female industrialist subjected to a kidnapping. Tired of watching her "class" being persecuted, Melato wreaks vengeance by abducting the head kidnapper, Sicilian bandit Michele Placido. She forces the gang to pony up $100,000, but the crooks manage to have the last laugh. Read More

10/31/86
Un Complicato Intrigo Di Donne, Vicoli E Delitti

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Ángela Molina, Harvey Keitel, Daniel Ezralow, Francisco Rabal, Paolo Bonacelli

Synopsis: The vicious drug-related killings of young pre-teen boys are the fuel that moves this mystery-actioner into high gear. After Annunziata (Angela Molina) opens up a hostel with her friend Antonio (Daniel Ezralow) she is saved from being raped by a Camorra (organized crime) boss when the gangster is Read More

10/3/86
Bellissimo: Images of the Italian Cinema

Synopsis: Survey of the history of Italian cinema, featuring clips from such classics as "Open City," "8-1/2," and "Seven Beauties," and interviews with illustrious stars and filmmakers, including Sophia Loren, Marcello Mastroianni, Toto, Monica Vitti, Anna Magnani, Vittorio DeSica, Federico Fellini, Pier Paolo Pasolini Read More

9/13/86
Sotto, Sotto

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Enrico Montesano, Veronica Lario, Luisa de Santis, Massimo Wertmuller

Synopsis: This Wertmuller sex comedy centers on a married couple who have found the magic gone from their physical relationship. The trouble begins when the wife, Ester, finds herself sexually attracted to her best friend Adele and one day tells her of the erotic dream she had in which she and Adele were Read More

1985
Scherzo del Destino in Agguate Dietro l'Angolo Come un Brigante da Strada

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Ugo Tognazzi, Piera Degli Esposti, Gastone Moschin, Roberto Herlitzka, Renzo Montagnani

Synopsis: In an irreverent send up of politicians and feminists and others, director and co-writer Lina Wertmuller has a Minister of the Interior locked inside his impermeable luxury car with only his broken computer to keep him company. Unfortunately, this accident happens at the villa of a conservative Read More

9/29/83
Belle Starr

Crew: Director

Actors: Elsa Martinelli

Synopsis: Elsa Martinelli plays the title outlaw in the made-for-Italian-TV Belle Starr. Though ostensibly based on historical fact, the film's chronology and character relationships are somewhat juggled with by director Lina Wertmuller. What emerges is a typically Wertmullerian "battle of the sexes" Read More

1979
Fatto di sangue fra due uomini per causa di una vedova - si sospettano moventi politici

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Sophia Loren, Marcello Mastroianni, Giancarlo Giannini, Turi Ferro, Mario Scarpetta, Antonella Murgia

Synopsis: After a beautiful woman's husband is murdered by the Sicilian Mafia, she is romanced by both an attorney and a local crook while maintaining her proper image. This Italian film stars Sophia Loren, Giancarlo Giannini and Marcello Mastroianni. ~ Kristie Hassen, All Movie Guide Read More

12/21/78
La Fine del Mondo nel Nostro Solito Letto in una Notte Piena di Pioggia

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Giancarlo Giannini, Candice Bergen, Michael Tucker, Mario Scarpetta, Lucio Amelio

Synopsis: Fine del Mondo nel Nostro Solito Letto in una Notte Piena di Pioggia, literally translated as "The End of the World in Our Usual Bed in a Night Full of Rain," was also released as Night Full of Rain. This film is director Lina Wertmuller's English-language film-debut. The poor critical and Read More

1/17/78
Seven Beauties

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Giancarlo Giannini, Fernando Rey, Shirley Stoler, Elena Fiore

Synopsis: Italian filmmaker Lina Wertmuller directs the black comedy Pasqualino Settebellezze (Seven Beauties). During WWII, Pasqualino Frafuso (Giancarlo Giannini) ends up lost in a dense forest along with fellow army deserter Francesco (Piero De Orio). After they witness a mass execution by German Read More

12/20/75
Swept Away... By an Unusual Destiny in the Blue Sea of August

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Giancarlo Giannini, Mariangela Melato

Synopsis: The Mediterranean sea is the backdrop for this social drama from director Lina Wertmuller. While vacationing on a yacht, the wealthy capitalist Raffaella (Mariangela Melato) shouts out orders in between spouting off political opinions amongst her friends. She is especially confrontational to the Read More

12/18/74
Tutto a posto e niente in ordine

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Luigi Diberti

Synopsis: Lina Wertmuller's flamboyant satire is an acquired taste, and this unpleasant sociopolitical comedy may be the acid test for potential devotees. Luigi Diberti stars in a scathing look at a group of rural youths who share a Milan apartment-commune in order to combat the economic oppression of urban Read More

2/21/74
Love and Anarchy

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Mariangela Melato, Giancarlo Giannini

Synopsis: Originally released in Italy as Film d'Amore e d'Anarchia, Lina Wertmuller's Love and Anarchy is set in the fascist-dominated Italy of the 1930s. Giancarlo Giannini plays an idealistic farmer swept up in an anti-fascist underground movement. His first task as a member is to assassinate Mussolini Read More

2/22/73
Brother Sun, Sister Moon

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Graham Faulkner, Judi Bowker, Alec Guinness, Leigh Lawson, Kenneth Cranham

Synopsis: St. Francis of Assisi was an extraordinarily complex and difficult figure whose effect on his contemporary society was electrifying. Even today, many people are moved by his visionary message of universal toleration. Twelfth-century Italy had an exceptionally grim and regimented society, but the Read More

3/28/72
When Women Lost Their Tails

Crew: Screenwriter

Synopsis: In this comic sequel to When Women Had Tails, a group of prehistoric men and women experiment with the recently discovered phenomenon of sex. ~ Iotis Erlewine, All Movie Guide Read More

2/24/72
The Seduction of Mimi

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Giancarlo Giannini, Mariangela Melato

Synopsis: Lina Wertmuller's fifth feature, The Seduction of Mimi, stars the director's favorite leading man, Giancarlo Giannini. Giannini plays the muddler of the title, who can't keep apace with the exigencies of a cruel, callous society (this character would be honed to perfection in Wertmuller's Read More

2/19/72
Quando le Donne Avevano la Coda

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Giuliano Gemma, Senta Berger, Lando Buzzanca, Frank Wolff, Lino Toffolo

Synopsis: This situation sex comedy falls somewhere in between vulgarity and burlesque. Ulli (Giuliano Gemma) and his six cave-dwelling cronies try to learn all the conveniences of their era -- like building fires, using the wheel, and perfecting the use of tools and weapons. A fire engulfs their tiny Read More

10/15/70
Violent City

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Charles Bronson, Jill Ireland, Umberto Orsini, Telly Savalas, Michel Constantin

Synopsis: This Italian crime melodrama was originally released as Citta Violenta. Charles Bronson stars as Jeff, an ex-convict living in New Orleans. Understandably, Jeff trusts no one but his curvaceous girl friend Vanessa (Jill Ireland). She is stolen away from him by Weber (Telly Savalas), the man who Read More

9/17/70
Non Stuzzicate La Zanzara

Crew: Director

3/22/67
Questa Volta Parliamo Di Uomini

Crew: Director

Actors: Nino Manfredi, Luciana Paluzzi, Milena Vukotic, Margaret Lee, Patrizia de Clara

Synopsis: Just before he became an even greater movie star, Nino Manfredi starred in a number of less well-known films. Among his best efforts from the end of this period is this film, where he plays four different kinds of male scoundrels in a series of smaller stories, all written and directed by Lina Wertmuller Read More

1965
Basilischi

Crew: Director

Actors: Stefano Satta Flores

Synopsis: Three young men in a small town in Southern Italy lead directionless lives wandering around town, telling lies and boasting about their alleged romantic conquests. When one goes off to Rome with his Aunt, he returns with fabulous stories about the nightlife, the women and the modern advancements Read More

9/2/63
8 1/2

Crew: First Assistant Director

Actors: Marcello Mastroianni, Claudia Cardinale, Anouk Aimée, Sandra Milo, Rossella Falk, Madeleine Le Beau

Synopsis: Fresh off of the international success of La Dolce Vita, master director Federico Fellini moved into the realm of self-reflexive autobiography with what is widely believed to be his finest and most personal work. Marcello Mastroianni delivers a brilliant performance as Fellini's alter ego Guido Read More

2/14/63