ROCCO E I SUOI FRATELLI/ROCCO AND HIS BROTHERS

ROCCO E I SUOI FRATELLI/ROCCO AND HIS BROTHERS (Italia/Francia, 1960, 180′)

Director: Luchino Visconti
Script: Luchino Visconti, Suso Cecchi D’Amico, Vasco Pratolini
Photography: Giuseppe Rotunno
Editing: Mario Serandrei
Music: Nino Rota
Starring: Alain Delon, Annie Girardot, Renato Salvatori, Katina Paxinou, Alessandra Panaro, Spiros Focás, Corrado Pani, Roger Hanin, Paolo Stoppa, Suzy Delair, Claudia Cardinale
Producer: Goffredo Lombardo
Production: Titanus, Les Films Marceau

Rocco Parondi, after his father’s death, decides to move to Milan with the whole family, where his brother Vincenzo had already emigrated to find better job opportunities. The big city will give rise to deep disagreements within the family and the meeting with Nadia will mark a point of no return between Rocco and his other brother Simone. Freely inspired by Dostoevskij and the tales of Giovanni Testori, Rocco e i suoi fratelli, after its preview at the Venice Film Festival, has been the subject of a long censorship and judicial affair.

Luchino Visconti (Milan, Italy, 1906 – Rome, Italy, 1976) was one of the most important and influential directors and intellectuals in Italy. He made his directorial debut with Ossessione (1943), considered a forefather of neorealism, to continue with La terra trema (1948) – an adaptation by Verga – and Bellissima (1951). With Senso – a movie that opens one of the most prolific debates on post-war Italian cinema – Visconti abandons any neorealist vein, then in the mid-Sixties he devotes himself to the making of Central European-inspired films. A multifaceted intellectual, Visconti also directed numerous theatrical works, put on the most important stages in Italy. Seriously ill, he passed away in Rome in 1976.

Filmography: Ossessione (1943), Giorni di gloria (1945, doc), La terra trema (1948), Bellissima (1951), Appunti su un fatto di cronaca (1951, doc), Siamo donne (1953), Senso (1954), Le notti bianche (1957), Rocco e i suoi fratelli (1960), Boccaccio ’70 (1962), Il Gattopardo (1963), Vaghe stelle dell’Orsa… (1965), Le streghe (1967), Lo straniero (1967), La caduta degli dei (1969), Alla ricerca di Tadzio (1970, doc), Morte a Venezia (1971), Ludwig (1973), Gruppo di famiglia in un interno (1974), L’innocente (1976).