One of things I miss the most right now is going to the movies. I’m one of those rare people who would much rather see a movie on the big screen than at home where, for some odd reason, I can never get comfortable enough to sit thorugh an entire movie. I especially miss The Crest Theater in Seattle where all movies are $4 bucks and you get to choose your own candies given they are sold (or used to be sold) by pound. You can pick a “little this and a little that” without spending a lot of money. Plus throw in the best cup of tea for $2 and it was the perfect – great indie film+little candy+tea all for under $10 bucks! Oh those were the days not so very long ago.

So I’m stuck with Netflix, Prime Video and all the other usual suspects. One nice thing about watching online though is being able to go back and watch movies from years past. I am especially fond of the Italian movies lately given I’ve had to cancel my trip Italy 3x in the past 12 months. But that’s another story.

Here are my favorites:

Cinema Paradiso

First and formost, I’ll start with my favorite Italian movie – Cinema Paradiso. Cinema Paradiso is a 1988 film directed by Giuseppe Tornatore and is one of my most favorite and cherished movies of all time. It’s a movie about movies and the impact they can have on people, more specifically on a small post-war Sicilian town and its two projectionists.

Cinema Paradiso is a love letter to cinema, a celebration of the movies and to those who cherish them, whether they are simply watchers or creators. The music in this movie is absolutely phenomenal. Scored by Ennio Morricone this film is pillowed in a painfully nostalgic theme song that can bring tears to the strongest souls, young or old.

No matter what age Toto is I can always relate to him and his feelings, I see my younger self. Whether he’s a little boy (or girl) who is enamoured by the cinema or as a lovelorn teenager who abandons his home to pursue his passion and even as an older man who returns to him home after 30 years, I understand and feel his emotions. Every time I’ve watched the film I’m a bit older than last time and understand things a bit better, like why Alfredo wanted Toto to leave his home and never return.  Once upon a time I never fully understood why Alfredo would want his best friend to leave him, now I know it’s because he wants to see him thrive and turn his passion into a career, something Alfredo was never able to do.

So, if you are a lover of a film foreign or not, Cinema Paradiso should be your next watch. It’s a fantastic tale of the magic movies can bring to its audiences and how it gave a young boy his entire life. It didn’t drastically change my life, but it’s a constant reminder of how important movies are to those who truly love them.

La Dolce Vita

Directed by Federico Fellini in 1960, with the performance of Marcello Mastroianni, who is a reflection of the Dolce Vita in Rome during the economic boom of the sixties. The Dolce Vita tells, with figurative strength the world of filmmaking, of the scandal, of the sad laziness of the richest people and the religious fanaticism. Marcello Rubini (M. Mastroianni) is a roman tabloid journalist who will guide us during the movie divided into seven episodes because he travels through the Rome of the sixties. He is the main character of the movie who changes and redeems himself at the end of the story. Federico Fellini here represented the thoughts, the attitudes, the trends of Italian which still today are famous for tourists (it is unforgettable the scene between Marcello Mastroianni and Anita Ekberg in the Trevi Fountain).

8 e mezzo

Another achievement for the couple Federico Fellini and Marcello Mastroianni is 8 e mezzo (1963) where Mastroianni is the alter ego of the director. Guido is a 43-year-old director who is tired of everything, of his work, of his life, of his friends. He wants to make a new film and he decided to build a big circus scaffolding. The film is a mixture of the real and the dreamlike, mirror of Guido’s fears, namely his old age, abandonment, and failure. The circus represents the creativity and relationships with Italian cinema workers, which are an essential part of the made in Italy cinema production.

Once Upon a Time in America

The movie came to the cinema in 1984 with the direction of Sergio Leone. The colossal represents the final evolution of the far west current, which came up after a few years of reflection.The story tells, for forty years, from the 1920s to 1960s, the life of a gangster group in New York. A long, complex, “baroque” movie with detailed stage customs and scenographies. Once Upon a Time in America with Robert De Niro’s performance is a treasure of Made in Italy movie production not only for the direction of Sergio Leone but also for the soundtrack written by the Master Ennio Morricone. 

Life is Beautiful

Life Is Beautiful is a 1997 Italian comedy-drama film directed by and starring Roberto Benigni. The movie won three Academy Awards, including Best Foreign Language Film and Best Actor for Benigni, the first for a male non-English performance in 1999. This movie will be in the heart of everyone for the sensitivity with which Benigni spoke of the tragedy of the Holocaust, the deportation, and the killing of Jewish during the Second World War.

The Great Beauty

The Great Beauty is a 2013 Italian art drama film co-written and directed by Paolo Sorrentino.  On the background of Rome, always beautiful but also indifferent, strut the politicians, the high society, actors and artists, the impoverished aristocrats inside a luxurious and sad labyrinth. From his position, the main character, Jep Gambardella ( starring Tony Servillo), watches all oh them; he is a 65 years-old writer, tired of that type of life and he started to reflect on his past, the present, and the future by taking us around Rome, crossing squares, streets, observing glimpse and wonder of an eternal Rome that seems almost surreal.