What's in a Title? Italian Cinema Volume V Quiz

Answer: Ossessione

The story of "Ossessione" was taken from James M. Cain's novel "The Postman Always Rings Twice", but it was overshadowed by Tay Garnet's film "The Postman Always Rings Twice" (1946) for many years. One of the reasons for this was that Visconti had failed to get the rights to the novel, so when Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer did, they effectively vetoed the distribution of "Ossessione" and it remained an unsung masterpiece for decades.

Italy's fascist government wasn't keen on the film either and destroyed all the prints which were in circulation. However, Visconti had kept a set of negatives and the film survived. The quality of the print is rough, but it's still well worth watching.

"Ossessione" is on the list of "100 Film Italiani da Salvare/100 Italian Films to Save".

Answer: The Bicycle Thieves

The film has been known as "The Bicycle Thief" and "The Bicycle Thieves". The latter is not only a more faithful translation of the original title, "Ladri di Biciclette", but also captures an essential detail which gives the film a dynamic twist.

It has headed countless lists of "greatest films of all time", is in the top ten on the BFI list of the "50 films you should see by the age of 14", has been cited as an influence by practically any director worth his or her salt, and is probably the first film which springs to mind when you think of Italian Neorealism. All well-deserved accolades, of course.

"The Bicycle Thieves/Ladri di Biciclette" is on the list of "100 Film Italiani da Salvare/100 Italian Films to Save".

Answer: Big Deal on Madonna Street

The planned robbery is from a pawnbroker's on Via Delle Madonne/Madonna Street, Rome. However, the Italian title is "I Soliti Ignoti" which literally translates as "the usual unknowns". It might be a reference to the line "round up the usual suspects" in "Casablanca", and the title "The Usual Suspects" would have probably snazzily grasped the concept better.

"Big Deal on Madonna Street" is the perfect comedy film. The hapless gang provide hilarious self-mockery of Italian stereotypes, and the film is a parody of heist films, most blatantly of "Rififi". Monicelli doesn't miss a single chance for humour, both cerebral and visceral. He could hardly go wrong with a cast which includes Vittorio Gassman as a stuttering boxer, Totò as a safe-cracking expert, Marcello Mastroianni as a feckless photographer, Carlo Pisacane as a famished veteran small-time crook, and Claudia Cardinale as a Sicilian beauty who is locked away by her over-protective brother. The over-protective brother is known as Ferribotte, an Italian mispronunciation of "ferry boat", since he comes from Sicily. Ferribotte is played brilliantly by Tiberio Murgia, who made a career out of playing Sicilians despite actually being Sardinian.

"Big Deal on Madonna Street" was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, but it lost out to "Mon Oncle". However, it is on the list of "100 Film Italiani da Salvare/100 Italian Films to Save".

Answer: L'Avventura

The filming of "L'Avventura" was an adventure in itself and Antonioni's determination to get it made is astounding. Filming was hampered by everything from unpredictable weather, bankruptcy, lack of supplies and transport, illness (Lea Massari, who played Anna, ended up in a coma), strikes, and shiftless extras. Furthermore, although it is now recognized as a masterpiece, it was greeted with jeering and booing by a nonplussed audience at its premiere at the 1960 Cannes Film Festival.

"L'Avventura" was the first in Antonioni's trilogy, the other two being "La Notte"/"The Night" (1961) and "L'Eclisse"/"The Eclipse". Both subsequent films maintained the high standard set by "L'Avventura" but didn't manage to surpass it, in my view. However, only "L'Eclisse/The Eclipse"is on the list of "100 Film Italiani da Salvare/100 Italian Films to Save".

Answer: Planet of the Vampires

By the time Mario Bava made "Planet of the Vampires"/Terrore Nello Spazio" in 1965, he had already been working in the film industry for over twenty years, first as a cinematographer (since 1943), and then as a director (since 1955). Bava worked in a plethora of genres, including giallo, sword-and-sandal, and slasher, but "Planet of the Vampires" marries the two he was best at - horror and sci-fi.

The film is imbued with an unsettling creepiness which actually alleviated rather that augmented by action. The outmoded special effects are anything but laughable and add to the feeling of everything being a bit outlandish.

Ridley Scott's "Alien" (1979) was clearly influenced by Bava's "Planet of the Vampires", most blatantly in its storyline, but I reckon some of the cold awkwardness too.

Answer: The Great Silence

The title "The Great Silence"/"Il Grande Silenzio" refers to the lone gunman who is known as Silence due to his muteness, which is a result of bounty hunters who killed his mother and father and then slit Silence's vocal chords as a child. Having a mute lead character must have been playfulness on Corbucci's part since westerns, and in particular Spaghetti Westerns, tend to have taciturn leads. However, it has also been rumoured that Jean-Louis Trintignant agreed to take on the role on condition that he didn't have any lines!

Loco, the most repulsive of the bounty hunters, is played by Klaus Kinski. Kinski appeared in cartloads of Spaghetti Westerns as well as other Italian productions in the 1960s and 1970s. In his autobiography, "Kinski Uncut", he denigrates such films and claims he just did them for the money. However, his performance in "The Great Silence" is wonderful.

Two things make "The Great Silence" stand out from the crowd, the unusual snowy setting and the even more atypical ending. Without spoiling it for anybody, its pessimism is surely matchless and unrivaled.

Answer: Street Law

"Street Law" features Barbara Bach as Barbara, Carlo's (Franco Nero) fiancée. Bach's career was almost entirely in Italian productions, including a handful of great giallos, until she met Ringo Starr in 1980. Franco Nero, whose real surname (Sparanero) translates as "Shootblack", has been a hugely prolific actor since starting in 1965's "Io la Conoscevo Bene".

As with most of Castellari's films, "Street Law"/"Il Cittadino Si Ribella" is extremely brutal at times, and although there is a corny friendship which develops, it doesn't pull too many punches in its gritty realism. Furthermore, its critique of the authorities' inability to catch crooks is hard-hitting and it hints at collusion between cops and robbers. Nevertheless, I'm not sure the message is one of DIY justice. Quite the opposite in fact since the consequences of vigilantism are quite clearly spelled out.

Answer: The Tree of Wooden Clogs

"The Tree of Wooden Clogs/L'Albero degli Zoccoli" is set at the end of the 19th century in rural Lombardy and most of it takes place in and around a cascina, which is an Italian farmhouse shared by several peasant farmers who work on a landlord's terrain. The bleak social realism won the film numerous awards and accolades and it is still cited today as one of the peaks of the genre.

Olmi didn't use professional actors and chose to cast ordinary people local to the area. One version of the film has them speaking in their local dialect (Bergamasque) with subtitles in Italian, a second has the same actors dubbing themselves in (almost) standard Italian.

"The Tree of Wooden Clogs/L'Albero degli Zoccoli" is on the list of "100 Film Italiani da Salvare/100 Italian Films to Save".

Answer: The Stendhal Syndrome

Dario Argento cast his daughter Asia Argento in the lead role of Detective Anna Manni who is sent to Florence from Rome on the trail of a serial rapist and murderer. Although Asia delivers a great performance, she is just too young (21) to be credible as an Italian police detective. Despite this pitfall and a couple of other flaws, The Stendhal Syndrome was a return to form for Dario Argento who'd been involved as either director, producer, or writer in a series of duds. Unfortunately, it was succeeded by another slew of lemons.

Stendhal syndrome is a real affliction, named by Florentine psychiatrist Graziella Magherini in the 1980s, after years of research. Essentially, it refers to dizziness, fainting, confusion and hallucinations due to the feelings of ecstasy one feels when exposed to great art. In the film, Detective Manni first faints and actually goes into the painting "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" by Pieter Bruegel the Elder.

Answer: The Great Beauty

The title comes late in the film when an almost-toothless nun who bears an uncanny resemblance to the late Teresa of Calcutta asks Jep why he hasn't written another book since his debut, which came out twenty years earlier. Jep answers "I have been looking for the great beauty, but I can't find it".

"The Great Beauty/La Grande Bellezza" is almost stifled by its apparent similarity to "La Dolce Vita", but its grotesque emptiness actually gives it some breathing space, and this hideous vision of contemporary society is much more than a simple updated version of Fellini's classic of 1960. It's beautifully filmed, and if Sorrentino is the heir to Fellini's throne, then Toni Servillo must be the new Marcello Mastroianni.

"The Great Beauty" won the 2013 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, the fourteenth Italian film to do so, which was more than any other country at the time. To my mind it's the only decent Italian film to win it since Fellini's "Amarcord" in 1974.