Subscribe to watch - 14-day free trial, then £4.99 a month
L'innocente
Luchino Visconti's final film is a brilliant and disturbing drama set against the opulent backdrop of decadent, late 19th-century aristocracy.
Period drama 1976 130 mins
Director: Luchino Visconti
Overview
Luchino Visconti, the father of Neorealism, revisits the themes from his masterpiece The Leopard, in his final work of art. Driven by a powerful performance by Giancarlo Giannini (Casino Royale, Hannibal) whose displays hitherto uncharted monstrosity, L’Innocente is set against the opulent backdrop of late-19th-century aristocratic life and its hypocritical social conventions; telling the story of Tullio (Giannini) who, having left his wife (Laura Antonelli) for his latest mistress (Jennifer O'Neill), is seized by jealous fury when he discovers that his wife has also taken a lover. Outraged by this unsuspected audacity, he will do everything to reconquer her…
This epoch-closing masterpiece is the director’s last film – Visconti died on its completion – and is now presented from a new restoration that enhances Visconti’s celebrated, painterly cinematography.
Related
Period drama
The General
Comedy 1926 79 mins Silent Director: Buster Keaton
Buster Keaton's masterpiece is widely and rightly regarded as one of the greatest comedies ever made.
Onibaba
Period drama 1964 102 mins Director: Kaneto Shindo
Stylish, symbolic and erotically charged Japanese horror in which the fortunes of a murderous mother-and-daughter team are upended by a strangely masked samurai.
The Marquise of O...
Period drama 1976 103 mins Director: Eric Rohmer
Eric Rohmer's first feature-length film after a four-year break from filmmaking is a German-language adaptation of Henrich von Kleist's classic novel, following the titular Marquise as she deals with an unwanted pregnancy.
The Seventh Seal
Fantasy 1957 96 mins Director: Ingmar Bergman
Ingmar Bergman’s best-known film is a brilliant allegorical drama starring Max von Sydow as a knight trying to elude his own death.
Smiles of a Summer Night
Comedy 1955 109 mins Director: Ingmar Bergman
Ingmar Bergman’s Cannes prize-winning comedy assembles various couples in a country house in 1900.
The Scarlet Letter
Period drama 1972 90 mins Director: Wim Wenders
Wim Wenders adapts the acclaimed novel in which a Puritan village chastises a young mother for giving birth out of wedlock.
Italian Classics
Germany, Year Zero
War 1948 73 mins Director: Roberto Rossellini
The concluding part of Roberto Rossellini’s celebrated War Trilogy, set amid the war-torn ruins of Berlin.
Medea
Drama 1970 111 mins Director: Pier Paolo Pasolini
Pier Paolo Pasolini directs opera singer Maria Callas in a vivid adaptation of Euripides' Greek tragedy.
Umberto D.
Drama 1952 89 mins Director: Vittorio De Sica
Vittorio De Sica’s heartbreaking classic about a destitute old man in Rome, trying to survive with only his faithful dog Flike for company.
Bicycle Thieves
Drama 1948 89 mins Director: Vittorio De Sica
Vittorio De Sica’s story of a father and son searching for a stolen bicycle on the streets of Rome is a classic of post-war Italian cinema.
The Machine that Kills Bad People
Comedy 1952 84 mins Director: Roberto Rossellini
Roberto Rossellini's film about a photographer who is given the power to rid the Earth of 'evil-doers'.
Before the Revolution
Drama 1964 107 mins Director: Bernardo Bertolucci
Bernardo Bertolucci's beautifully operatic film celebrates the passion and ideology of the 1960s, winner of the Cannes Critics' Week prize in 1964.
Directed by Luchino Visconti
Boccaccio '70
Anthology 1962 204 mins Director: Mario Monicelli
Four of the greatest Italian directors – Fellini, Visconti, De Sica and Monicelli – join forces with show-stoppers Sophia Loren, Anita Ekberg and Romy Schneider in a carousel of sex and satire mocking the mores of Italian '60s society.
Rocco and His Brothers
Drama 1960 179 mins Director: Luchino Visconti
Italian maestro Luchino Visconti’s epic drama follows a mother and her five sons who move from a small town to Milan, changing their lives forever.
New
Obsession
Romance 1976 98 mins Director: Brian De Palma
High melodrama, creeping insanity and barely contained delirium abound in this dizzying tribute to the high tension thrillers of Alfred Hitchcock from director Brian De Palma.
The Olive Tree
Drama 2016 99 mins Director: Icíar Bollaín
A spirited young woman embarks on a journey from the East coast of Spain to Germany in order to retrieve an ancient olive tree precious to her ailing grandfather.
Kiss of the Damned
Horror 2012 95 mins Director: Xan Cassavetes
A cool and contemporary take on the vampire myth, steeped in atmosphere and brooding contemplation.
My 20th Century
Drama 1989 99 mins Director: Ildikó Enyedi
Ildikó Enyedi's magical tale of twin girls born in Budapest at the very moment that Edison’s wondrous electric light-bulb is unveiled to the world.
The Cave of the Yellow Dog
Drama 2005 89 mins Director: Byambasuren Davaa
A Mongolian nomad family find themselves in disagreement when the oldest daughter, Nansal, finds a small dog and brings it home, in Davaa Byambasuren's reflective, naturalistic fable.
Faithless
Drama 2000 154 mins Director: Liv Ullmann
Ingmar Bergman scripts this semi-autobiographical drama directed by his closest collaborator, Liv Ullmann, about a theatre director facing up to the pain he inflicted upon his muse.