Italian producer Massimo Cristaldi, who as a production manager worked with masters such as Federico Fellini and Francesco Rosi before setting up his own company and shepherding films including prizewinning drama “Sicilian Ghost Story,” has died. He was 66.
Cristaldi’s death was announced over the weekend by his Rome-based company Cristaldi Pictures in a statement that did not specify the cause.
Born in 1956, Massimo Cristaldi was the only son of prominent producer Franco Cristaldi, the triple Oscar-winner who made Pietro Germi’s “Divorce Italian Style,” Federico Fellini’s “Amarcord” and Giuseppe Tornatore’s “Cinema Paradiso.”
In 1974 Massimo Cristaldi started cutting his teeth in the film business first as a production assistant and eventually, starting in the 1980s, becoming a line producer on many of his father’s productions, working with Fellini, Rosi, Tornatore, and many other Italian cinema greats.
After Franco Cristaldi’s death in 1992, he took over management of...
Cristaldi’s death was announced over the weekend by his Rome-based company Cristaldi Pictures in a statement that did not specify the cause.
Born in 1956, Massimo Cristaldi was the only son of prominent producer Franco Cristaldi, the triple Oscar-winner who made Pietro Germi’s “Divorce Italian Style,” Federico Fellini’s “Amarcord” and Giuseppe Tornatore’s “Cinema Paradiso.”
In 1974 Massimo Cristaldi started cutting his teeth in the film business first as a production assistant and eventually, starting in the 1980s, becoming a line producer on many of his father’s productions, working with Fellini, Rosi, Tornatore, and many other Italian cinema greats.
After Franco Cristaldi’s death in 1992, he took over management of...
- 4/11/2022
- by Nick Vivarelli
- Variety Film + TV
Giuseppe Tornatore’s romantic ode to the movies charmed America, convincing theater-goers that little Italian kids are the cutest in the world. Little Salvatore Cascio grows up in a projection booth under the life-tutelage of kindly Philippe Noiret. Arrow presents the theatrical version of this Best Foreign Picture Oscar winner in 4K Ultra HD. The (greatly) extended version is on a second Blu-ray — it plays like a different movie entirely.
Cinema Paradiso
4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray
Arrow Academy
1988 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 174, 155, 124 min. / Nuovo cinema Paradiso / Street Date December 8, 2020 / 49.95
Starring: Philippe Noiret, Antonella Attili, Salvatore Cascio, Marco Leonardi, Jacques Perrin, Agnese Nano, Brigitte Fossey, Pupella Maggio, Leopoldo Trieste.
Cinematography: Blasco Giurato
Film Editor: Mario Morra
Original Music: Ennio Morricone, Andrea Morricone
Produced by Mino Barbera, Franco Cristaldi, Giovanna Romagnoli
Written and Directed by Giuseppe Tornatore
Every so often there comes along a European movie that so captures American audiences, one would...
Cinema Paradiso
4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray
Arrow Academy
1988 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 174, 155, 124 min. / Nuovo cinema Paradiso / Street Date December 8, 2020 / 49.95
Starring: Philippe Noiret, Antonella Attili, Salvatore Cascio, Marco Leonardi, Jacques Perrin, Agnese Nano, Brigitte Fossey, Pupella Maggio, Leopoldo Trieste.
Cinematography: Blasco Giurato
Film Editor: Mario Morra
Original Music: Ennio Morricone, Andrea Morricone
Produced by Mino Barbera, Franco Cristaldi, Giovanna Romagnoli
Written and Directed by Giuseppe Tornatore
Every so often there comes along a European movie that so captures American audiences, one would...
- 1/12/2021
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Robert Lasky, a Hollywood attorney and co-founder of the Agency of the Performing Arts (APA) whose client list included Liberace, Johnny Cash, Brigitte Bardot and Harry Belafonte to name a few, died on Sept. 16. Lasky was 91.
Lasky passed away of complications from sepsis at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, his family announced.
Lasky played as integral role in the founding of APA which launched in 1962. Lasky co-founded the agency in New York alongside fellow co-founders David Baumgarten, Roger Vorce and Harvey Litwin. APA would expand and opened up offices in Los Angeles, Nashville, Atlanta, Toronto and London and has a client list which include Academy Award winner Gary Oldman, singer Mary J. Blige, Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson and Famke Janssen.
A Brooklyn-born native of Russian and Hungarian descent, Lasky came from a long line of lawyers. Lasky attended Harvard University, where he was elected Phi Betta Kappa and graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1951. Lasky earned his LL.
Lasky passed away of complications from sepsis at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, his family announced.
Lasky played as integral role in the founding of APA which launched in 1962. Lasky co-founded the agency in New York alongside fellow co-founders David Baumgarten, Roger Vorce and Harvey Litwin. APA would expand and opened up offices in Los Angeles, Nashville, Atlanta, Toronto and London and has a client list which include Academy Award winner Gary Oldman, singer Mary J. Blige, Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson and Famke Janssen.
A Brooklyn-born native of Russian and Hungarian descent, Lasky came from a long line of lawyers. Lasky attended Harvard University, where he was elected Phi Betta Kappa and graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1951. Lasky earned his LL.
- 9/25/2020
- by Umberto Gonzalez
- The Wrap
Robert L. Lasky, attorney and cofounder of Agency of the Performing Arts whose clients once included Liberace, Johnny Cash and Harry Belafonte, died Sept. 16. He was 91. His death was announced by APA. A cause was not immediately available.
Lasky played an integral role in APA’s 1962 founding in New York, with David Baumgarten, Roger Vorce and Harvey Litwin. The agency subsequently launched offices in Los Angeles, Nashville, Atlanta, Toronto and London, and today is a leading talent agency with a roster of clients including Gary Oldman, Mary J. Blige, Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson and Famke Janssen, among others.
Lasky was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, of Russian and Hungarian descent, to a long line of attorneys. He attended Harvard University, where he was elected Phi Betta Kappa and graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1951. He then went on to receive his LL.B. from Yale School of Law in 1955, and...
Lasky played an integral role in APA’s 1962 founding in New York, with David Baumgarten, Roger Vorce and Harvey Litwin. The agency subsequently launched offices in Los Angeles, Nashville, Atlanta, Toronto and London, and today is a leading talent agency with a roster of clients including Gary Oldman, Mary J. Blige, Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson and Famke Janssen, among others.
Lasky was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, of Russian and Hungarian descent, to a long line of attorneys. He attended Harvard University, where he was elected Phi Betta Kappa and graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1951. He then went on to receive his LL.B. from Yale School of Law in 1955, and...
- 9/25/2020
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
It’s a perfect movie for a dark time: Carlo Levi’s famed novel about a political undesirable became a major Italian miniseries by the great Francesco Rosi, starring the now-legendary Gian Maria Volontè. In Mussolini’s most popular years of make-Italy-great-again Fascism, a dissident is given an indefinite ‘time out,’ an exile to a small town in a corner of the country so remote and primitive that not even Christianity could fully change it. He expects nothing but receives revelations about his country, his life and one’s place in society. It’s meditative, it’s illuminating, it’s like a book one can’t put down. It’s also uncut, as opposed to the theatrical version that made a splash here in 1980, as simply Eboli.
Christ Stopped at Eboli
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 1043
1979 / Color / 1:33 flat / 220 150, 120 min. / Cristo si è fermato a Eboli / available through The Criterion Collection...
Christ Stopped at Eboli
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 1043
1979 / Color / 1:33 flat / 220 150, 120 min. / Cristo si è fermato a Eboli / available through The Criterion Collection...
- 9/22/2020
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Writer-director Elio Petri scores big in his first feature, the story of a heel suspected of murder. Is he a killer, or just an average guy trying to get ahead, who uses women to his advantage? Marcello Mastroianni impresses as well in a serious role, with Salvo Randone shining as the police inspector trying to pry a confession from him. Beautifully restored in HD; the show is from a time when Italian film was at its zenith.
The Assassin
Blu-ray + DVD
Arrow Video USA
1961 / B&W / 1:85 widescreen / 97 min. / Street Date April 18, 2017 / L’Assassino / Available from Arrow Video
Starring: Marcello Mastroianni, Micheline Presle, Cristina Gaioni, Salvo Randone, Andrea Checchi, Francesco Grandjacquet, Marco Mariani, Franco Ressel.
Cinematography: Carlo Di Palma
Film Editor: Ruggero Mastroianni
Original Music: Piero Piccione
Written by Tonino (Antonio) Guerra, Elio Petri, Pasquale Fest Campanile, Massimo Franciosa
Produced by Franco Cristaldi
Directed by Elio Petri
Fans of Elio Petri...
The Assassin
Blu-ray + DVD
Arrow Video USA
1961 / B&W / 1:85 widescreen / 97 min. / Street Date April 18, 2017 / L’Assassino / Available from Arrow Video
Starring: Marcello Mastroianni, Micheline Presle, Cristina Gaioni, Salvo Randone, Andrea Checchi, Francesco Grandjacquet, Marco Mariani, Franco Ressel.
Cinematography: Carlo Di Palma
Film Editor: Ruggero Mastroianni
Original Music: Piero Piccione
Written by Tonino (Antonio) Guerra, Elio Petri, Pasquale Fest Campanile, Massimo Franciosa
Produced by Franco Cristaldi
Directed by Elio Petri
Fans of Elio Petri...
- 5/8/2017
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Yvonne Monlaur: Cult horror movie actress & Bond Girl contender was featured in the 1960 British classics 'Circus of Horrors' & 'The Brides of Dracula.' Actress Yvonne Monlaur dead at 77: Best remembered for cult horror classics 'Circus of Horrors' & 'The Brides of Dracula' Actress Yvonne Monlaur, best known for her roles in the 1960 British cult horror classics Circus of Horrors and The Brides of Dracula, died of cardiac arrest on April 18 in the Paris suburb of Neuilly-sur-Seine. Monlaur was 77. According to various online sources, she was born Yvonne Thérèse Marie Camille Bédat de Monlaur in the southwestern town of Pau, in France's Pyrénées-Atlantiques department, on Dec. 15, 1939. Her father was poet and librettist Pierre Bédat de Monlaur; her mother was a Russian ballet dancer. The young Yvonne was trained in ballet and while still a teenager became a model for Elle magazine. She was “discovered” by newspaper publisher-turned-director André Hunebelle,...
- 4/27/2017
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Giuseppe Tornatore’s ode to the Italian love of movies was a major hit here in 1990, despite being severely cut by Miramax. In 2002 the director reworked his long version into an almost three-hour sentimental epic that enlarges the film’s scope and deepens its sentiments.
Cinema Paradiso
Region B Blu-ray
Arrow Academy
1988 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / Special Edition / 174, 155, 124 min. /
Nuovo cinema Paradiso / Street Date March 21, 2017 / 39.95
Starring: Philippe Noiret, Antonella Attili, Salvatore Cascio, Marco Leonardi, Jacques Perrin, Agnese Nano, Brigitte Fossey, Pupella Maggio, Leopoldo Trieste
Cinematography: Blasco Giurato
Production Designer: Andrea Crisanti
Film Editor: Mario Morra
Original Music: Ennio and Andrea Morricone
Produced by Mino Barbera, Franco Cristaldi, Giovanna Romagnoli
Written and Directed by Giuseppe Tornatore
Your average foreign import movie, it seems, makes a brief splash around Oscar time and then disappears as if down a rabbit hole. A few years back I saw a fantastic Argentine movie called The Secret in Their Eyes.
Cinema Paradiso
Region B Blu-ray
Arrow Academy
1988 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / Special Edition / 174, 155, 124 min. /
Nuovo cinema Paradiso / Street Date March 21, 2017 / 39.95
Starring: Philippe Noiret, Antonella Attili, Salvatore Cascio, Marco Leonardi, Jacques Perrin, Agnese Nano, Brigitte Fossey, Pupella Maggio, Leopoldo Trieste
Cinematography: Blasco Giurato
Production Designer: Andrea Crisanti
Film Editor: Mario Morra
Original Music: Ennio and Andrea Morricone
Produced by Mino Barbera, Franco Cristaldi, Giovanna Romagnoli
Written and Directed by Giuseppe Tornatore
Your average foreign import movie, it seems, makes a brief splash around Oscar time and then disappears as if down a rabbit hole. A few years back I saw a fantastic Argentine movie called The Secret in Their Eyes.
- 3/14/2017
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Sixties screen siren Claudia Cardinale talks to Steve Rose about entrancing Fellini, spurning Brando – and why appearing in 135 films still isn't enough
There's nothing Claudia Cardinale hates more than staying still, but for the past two months she's had to do exactly that. She broke her foot on holiday in Tunisia and has since been holed up in her Paris flat. "It was stupid," she says, in her distinctive Mediterranean rasp. "I was playing volleyball. There was water on the edge of swimming pool, and I slipped. I like to be active, so when I have to sit for two months without going out, it's terrible. I had many places to go and I had to refuse: Venice, Kiev, Osaka. Now it's Ok. Yesterday I went out for the first time, but the weather is ugly."
Cardinale is a survivor from the era when movie giants walked the earth – most of them alongside her.
There's nothing Claudia Cardinale hates more than staying still, but for the past two months she's had to do exactly that. She broke her foot on holiday in Tunisia and has since been holed up in her Paris flat. "It was stupid," she says, in her distinctive Mediterranean rasp. "I was playing volleyball. There was water on the edge of swimming pool, and I slipped. I like to be active, so when I have to sit for two months without going out, it's terrible. I had many places to go and I had to refuse: Venice, Kiev, Osaka. Now it's Ok. Yesterday I went out for the first time, but the weather is ugly."
Cardinale is a survivor from the era when movie giants walked the earth – most of them alongside her.
- 9/12/2013
- by Steve Rose
- The Guardian - Film News
Chicago – What is striking about George Chakiris is not so much the memories of his unforgettable performances in films of another era, but his true kindness and humility in the wake of all that jazz. Winner of the Best Supporting Actor Oscar in 1961, playing Bernardo in “West Side Story,” the combination of his youth, energy and gratitude comes from his roots as a dancer.
Chakiris was born of Greek immigrant parents in Norwood, Ohio. Ending up in Los Angeles at a young age, he was able to hook into his advocation by studying at the American School of Dance there (story below). He touched the last gasp era of great Hollywood musicals, famously backing up Marilyn Monroe in the “Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend” number from the film “Gentleman Prefer Blondes” [1953] and started hearts a-fluttering when he made a key cameo one year later in the holiday film classic,...
Chakiris was born of Greek immigrant parents in Norwood, Ohio. Ending up in Los Angeles at a young age, he was able to hook into his advocation by studying at the American School of Dance there (story below). He touched the last gasp era of great Hollywood musicals, famously backing up Marilyn Monroe in the “Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend” number from the film “Gentleman Prefer Blondes” [1953] and started hearts a-fluttering when he made a key cameo one year later in the holiday film classic,...
- 2/12/2012
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
The luminous star of 8½ and The Leopard, Claudia Cardinale lit up the screen in the 1960s. She talks to Steve Rose about life as a muse, her 'man's voice' – and never going naked
Being in London is making Claudia Cardinale nostalgic. The Italian actor remembers shooting one of her first films here, in 1959: Upstairs and Downstairs, a forgotten domestic comedy. She met the Queen at the premiere of West Side Story in Leicester Square in 1962, and looked the more regal of the two. She came here to see one of Marlene Dietrich's last concerts, in 1973, with her friend and regular director Luchino Visconti. "In his room he kept a signed photo of Marlene Dietrich, in her costume. Fantastic!"
This time, she's here for the London Turkish film festival, which opened last month with a new film starring herself; but on a quiet afternoon in a Mayfair hotel, the...
Being in London is making Claudia Cardinale nostalgic. The Italian actor remembers shooting one of her first films here, in 1959: Upstairs and Downstairs, a forgotten domestic comedy. She met the Queen at the premiere of West Side Story in Leicester Square in 1962, and looked the more regal of the two. She came here to see one of Marlene Dietrich's last concerts, in 1973, with her friend and regular director Luchino Visconti. "In his room he kept a signed photo of Marlene Dietrich, in her costume. Fantastic!"
This time, she's here for the London Turkish film festival, which opened last month with a new film starring herself; but on a quiet afternoon in a Mayfair hotel, the...
- 12/8/2011
- by Steve Rose
- The Guardian - Film News
One of Italy's leading screenwriters, he worked on 140 films
One of Italy's most respected and prolific screenwriters, Furio Scarpelli, who has died aged 90, worked on the scripts of about 140 films, sometimes without a credit, and received three shared Oscar nominations, for I Compagni (The Organiser, 1963), Casanova '70 (1965) and Il Postino (1994). Scarpelli enjoyed a lengthy writing partnership, from 1949 until 1985, with Agenore Incrocci, also known as Age. The pair collaborated on the 1958 film I Soliti Ignoti (Big Deal on Madonna Street), about a team of makeshift thieves, which owed much of its success to the brilliant comic characterisations. The film, starring Vittorio Gassman and Marcello Mastroianni, helped to launch the genre of commedia all'italiana ("comedy Italian-style").
Scarpelli was born in Rome. His Neapolitan father, Filiberto, was a satirical writer who founded a humorous magazine, Il Travaso delle Idee. Furio began his own career as a cartoonist. It was after the second world war,...
One of Italy's most respected and prolific screenwriters, Furio Scarpelli, who has died aged 90, worked on the scripts of about 140 films, sometimes without a credit, and received three shared Oscar nominations, for I Compagni (The Organiser, 1963), Casanova '70 (1965) and Il Postino (1994). Scarpelli enjoyed a lengthy writing partnership, from 1949 until 1985, with Agenore Incrocci, also known as Age. The pair collaborated on the 1958 film I Soliti Ignoti (Big Deal on Madonna Street), about a team of makeshift thieves, which owed much of its success to the brilliant comic characterisations. The film, starring Vittorio Gassman and Marcello Mastroianni, helped to launch the genre of commedia all'italiana ("comedy Italian-style").
Scarpelli was born in Rome. His Neapolitan father, Filiberto, was a satirical writer who founded a humorous magazine, Il Travaso delle Idee. Furio began his own career as a cartoonist. It was after the second world war,...
- 5/17/2010
- by John Francis Lane
- The Guardian - Film News
Italian model and film actor, she left the cinema and joined the jet set
Rosanna Schiaffino, who has died aged 69, was one of those Italian beauty queens who began a promising acting career in the post-neorealist cinema of the 1950s. She gave up the cinema in the 1970s and married the handsome playboy and steel industry heir Giorgio Falck. Their marriage and, a decade later, their break-up and divorce, had overtones of melodrama more piquant than the content of any of the 45 films in which Schiaffino had starred.
She was born in Genoa, in north Italy, into a well-off family and, although her father wanted her to pursue studies as a surveyor, her mother encouraged her showbusiness ambitions, helping her to study privately at a drama school and then to take part in beauty contests, which she usually won. These led to modelling jobs, with photographs in important magazines, including Life.
Rosanna Schiaffino, who has died aged 69, was one of those Italian beauty queens who began a promising acting career in the post-neorealist cinema of the 1950s. She gave up the cinema in the 1970s and married the handsome playboy and steel industry heir Giorgio Falck. Their marriage and, a decade later, their break-up and divorce, had overtones of melodrama more piquant than the content of any of the 45 films in which Schiaffino had starred.
She was born in Genoa, in north Italy, into a well-off family and, although her father wanted her to pursue studies as a surveyor, her mother encouraged her showbusiness ambitions, helping her to study privately at a drama school and then to take part in beauty contests, which she usually won. These led to modelling jobs, with photographs in important magazines, including Life.
- 11/18/2009
- by John Francis Lane
- The Guardian - Film News
Pupi Avati's "Giovanna's Father" will have its world premiere at the Mann Chinese 6 Hollywood Theatre on Feb. 15 as the opening event of the weeklong fourth annual Los Angeles Italia -- Film, Fashion and Art Festival.
The celebration of Italian culture will showcase of the U.S. premieres of four other Italian films: Massimo Spano's documentary "Franco Cristaldi: An Italian Legend," Maurizio Scaparro's "The Last Pulcinella," Brando de LSica's "Christian de Sica: Talk About Me" and Pierpaolo Pasolini's "La Rabbia."
Chaired by Oscar-winning filmmaker Bobby Moresco and co-chaired by Marina Cicogna, Tony Renis, Mark Canton, Paul Haggis and Steven Zaillian, the fest, headed by festival director Pascal Vicedomini, also will include a tribute to the late Anthony Minghella.
"Most people know Anthony Minghella from his big studio movies like 'The English Patient' and 'Cold Mountain.' But there will always be a place in my heart for a little movie called 'Truly,...
The celebration of Italian culture will showcase of the U.S. premieres of four other Italian films: Massimo Spano's documentary "Franco Cristaldi: An Italian Legend," Maurizio Scaparro's "The Last Pulcinella," Brando de LSica's "Christian de Sica: Talk About Me" and Pierpaolo Pasolini's "La Rabbia."
Chaired by Oscar-winning filmmaker Bobby Moresco and co-chaired by Marina Cicogna, Tony Renis, Mark Canton, Paul Haggis and Steven Zaillian, the fest, headed by festival director Pascal Vicedomini, also will include a tribute to the late Anthony Minghella.
"Most people know Anthony Minghella from his big studio movies like 'The English Patient' and 'Cold Mountain.' But there will always be a place in my heart for a little movie called 'Truly,...
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.