For those who love the great masters. For those fascinated by Italian history. For those who want to revisit the classics — or discover them for the first time. From June 4 through June 25, History Italian Style brings to the Walter Reade Theater an extensive and richly curated retrospective dedicated to twentieth-century Italian cinema. Twenty-nine films trace the history of Italy itself: from Garibaldi’s campaign and the unification of the country to World War I, from the rise of Fascism to the devastation of World War II.
The series begins immediately after the conclusion of Open Roads: New Italian Cinema, the annual showcase of contemporary Italian cinema at the Lincoln Center. From the new cinematic paths of the present to the classics of the past — which are sometimes censored or overlooked — History Italian Style offers American audiences the rare opportunity to experience masterpieces that, at the time of their release, rarely received proper North American distribution. The program also includes contemporary films about Italian history by Marco Bellocchio, Alice Rohrwacher, and Pietro Marcello.
