Marco Bellocchio

Rosebush Pruning (2026)

When an American heir living in a luxurious Spanish villa decides to move in with his girlfriend, his departure triggers a family collapse as his brother uncovers the truth behind their mother's tragic death. ...

The Time It Takes (2024)

A devoted father working in film shares a magical bond with his daughter, but as she enters adolescence and falls into addiction, he takes her to Paris in a final effort to save her and their fading connection. ...

Battlefield (2024)

These are the years of the First World War and Dr. Stefano Zorzi spends his days in the Exemption Clinic in a large city of Northern Italy, where he not only takes care of soldiers who arrive from the massacre of the front, but also he fights simulation an ...

If I May - Chapter II (2024)

Over the course of a day, Fausto, invincible in his inertia, watches a paradoxical procession of visitors pass by: the mellifluous parish priest of the town; a mysterious man with his absurd ghost-themed business idea; the captain of the Carabinieri who pr ...

The Life Apart (2024)

In Vicenza, a beautiful Italian art city, a young wealthy couple joyfully welcomes the birth of a long-awaited daughter in the early 1980s. But the child's face is disfigured by a red birthmark that covers half her face. This spot haunts the mother to the ...

Kidnapped (2023)

The story of Edgardo Mortara, a young Jewish boy living in Bologna, Italy, who in 1858, after being secretly baptized, was forcibly taken from his family to be raised as a Christian. His parents' struggle to free their son became part of a larger political ...

Esterno Notte - Seconda Parte (2022)

The 1978 kidnapping and assassination of former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro by Red Brigades terrorists ...

Esterno Notte - Prima Parte (2022)

The 1978 kidnapping and assassination of former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro by Red Brigades terrorists. ...

If I May (2021)

A man wanders the streets of a small provincial town, obsessed by the idea of meddling in the lives of others. ...

Marx Can Wait (2021)

"Marx can wait" was something Camillo Bellocchio said to his twin Marco the last time they met before the former died at a young age in the heated days of 1968. This documentary is dedicated to his memory. ...

The Traitor (2019)

Palermo, Sicily, 1980. Mafia member Tommaso Buscetta decides to move to Brazil with his family fleeing the constant war between the different clans of the criminal organization. But when, after living several misfortunes, he is forced to return to Italy, h ...

The Fight (2018)

It is a sunny day on the river Trebbia. In the distance a patrol of German soldiers is approaching : they are nazis, guns blazing. It seems like they are chasing somebody. Tonino is the fugitive, a partisan with nothing left to do but dive into the river. ...

All for a Rose (2017)

Elena has just turned 18 and this is her first day working in a coffee bar in Bobbio, a town in the north of Italy. It's summer and the coffee bar is very busy. The first day at work is a chance for Elena to meet lots of different people. Each person has a ...

Sweet Dreams (2016)

Turin, 1969. Nine-year-old Massimo's idyllic childhood is shattered by the mysterious death of his mother. The young boy refuses to accept this brutal loss, even if the priest says she is now in Heaven. Years later in the 90s, adult Massimo has become an a ...

Clowns (2016)

In the theater of a small village, rehersals are taking place for a show based on the opera I Pagliacci. There is no orchestra, just a piano and the singers. Amongs the few people in the audience there is the mother of the singer, a rich local lady and fin ...

Blood of My Blood (2015)

In the Middle Ages, Federico, a soldier, visits the convent in Bobbio, where Sister Benedetta is facing charges of witchery for seducing Fabrizio, Federico's twin brother, and making him betray his priestly mission. Federico hopes to secure his brother a b ...

Fragments (2012)

Fragments of a collaboration between director Franco Piavoli (The Blue Planet, The First Breath of Wind) and students of the Laboratory Making Cinema founded by Marco Bellocchio. ...

Dormant Beauty (2012)

A mosaic of several intertwined stories questioning the meaning of life, love and hope, set during the last six days in the life of Eluana Englaro, a young woman who spent 17 years in a vegetative state. ...

It Was the Son (2012)

The Ciraulo family lives in the miserable district of Palermo called "Zen". When one of their children dies in a shootout between mafia gangsters they receive compensation and buy a luxury black Volvo. Things go wrong when Trancredi, another son, takes the ...

Sorelle Mai (2011)

The film, a nostalgic fantasy documentary, depicts in six episodes a family story in Bobbio between 1999 and 2008. We discover the 5 years-old Elena being brought up by her aunts (Marco Bellocchio's sisters) because her mother Sara is trying to succeed as ...

Vincere (2009)

The story of the descent into madness of Mussolini's secret first wife, Ida Dasler, who was seduced by his passion and vigor but blind to the fascist dictator's many flaws. ...

Sorelle (2007)

An early version of Marco Bellocchio's Sorelle Mai ...

The Wedding Director (2006)

Franco Elica is a film director casting a remake of a pious melodrama in Rome. He's melancholy, heading south for a break. On a beach, he meets a man who films weddings and is roped into helping film the wedding of the daughter of a severe and imperious pr ...

Materia e visione (2006)

Il Regista di Matrimoni from Marco Bellocchio seen from a different point of view, a movie inside a movie. ...

Behind Love and Anger (2005)

Documentary about the anthology film Love and Anger (1969) with interviews with Carlo Lizzani (director of the segment "L'indifferenza"), Marco Bellocchio (director of the segment "Discutiamo, discussamo"), Maurizio Ponzi (assistant director of the segment ...

Radio West (2004)

Three Italian soldiers volunteer to go to Kosovo after the war, where they risk their lives to help a young girl. ...

Good Morning, Night (2003)

The 1978 kidnapping and murder of Aldo Moro, president of the most important political party in Italy at the time, Democrazia Cristiana, as seen from the perspective of one of his assailants -- a conflicted young woman in the ranks of the Red Brigade. ...

The Spring of 2002 - Italy Protests, Italy Stops (2002)

My Mother's Smile (2002)

A celebrated painter receives a visit from a cardinal's assistant, who informs him that his mother could become a saint. ...

Farewell to the Past (2002)

It is a unusual documentary that mixes the music of famous opera composer Giuseppe Verdi with places, faces and voices from Piacenza, a nice place in the north of Italy where Verdi lived and composed his music. Probably it could have been more interesting ...

Today is a Beautiful Day (2002)

A child in anaphylactic shock after an insect sting is brought by her father to a doctor, a foreigner who doesn't speak the language well and is looked at by the town with diffidence. ...

Notes for a Movie About Uncle Vania (2002)

An encounter between two women: Sonia confesses to Elena that she would like to escape her town and her friend promises to help her. ...

Nina (2000)

Based on Anton Chekhov's The Seagull. ...

A Thread of Passion (2000)

A short film. ...

Fresco (2000)

A young man lives as a recluse in a monastery. In a sort of ecstasy, he begins to talk to nature and recite the gospels. ...

The Choir Master (2000)

A young maestro conducts rehearsals with a male chorus. He is frustrated and feels that a female voice is missing. ...

The Nanny (1999)

Rome, early 20th century: a wealthy psychiatrist, who runs an asylum for women and lacks imagination in his practice, must find a wet nurse for his infant when his wife panics after childbirth. He brings a peasant, Annette, to Rome, forcing her to leave he ...

The Prince of Homburg (1997)

The Prince of Homburg, disobeys orders and leads a cavalry charge in battle against the Swedes, which leads to victory. He is court martialled however for disobeying orders and sentenced to death. His love who is now to be betrothed to the King of Sweden, ...

Elena (1997)

A two year old girl, surprised and moved, watches her past materialize via amateur footage on the family TV set. She watches without regrets or nostalgia: it's normal. But it's her own story which began two years before. A short film by Marco Bellocchio. ...

Celebrate Cinema 101 (1996)

This film project was made in 1996 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the birth of the cinema. ...

Rome, November 12, 1994 (1995)

Francesco Maselli pitched this documentary to the CGIL, CISL, and UIL trade unions as part of the 1.5 million-strong protest march on November 12, 1994 against Silvio Berlusconi's projects on social security and the reform of the pension system. A large nu ...

Broken Dreams: Reasoning and Delirium (1995)

Using archival footage and interviews with ex-Red Brigade activists and the ex-leader of the Italian Marxist-Leninists, this documentary explores the topics terrorism and the "broken dream" of the communist revolution. ...

The Butterfly's Dream (1994)

This European existential drama utilizes complex symbols inspired by abstract psychological theories to explore the effects and reasons behind a young classical actor's decision to stop talking. No one knows why Massimo has vowed to stop talking. Other tha ...

The Man with the Flower in His Mouth (1993)

In a train station caffè, a man ill with cancer and an indifferent customer converse. Based on a play by Luigi Pirandello. ...

The Conviction (1991)

A girl and her art professor get trapped inside a castle-museum after it closes at night. After a little resistance she agrees to have sex with him, but then she sues the professor for rape. The professor will have to prove his innocence. ...

The Witches' Sabbath (1988)

The freshly graduated psychiatrist David shall deliver an opinion about young Maddalena, who's on trial for murdering a hunter. She claims she's a witch and acted on behalf of the devil. ...

Devil in the Flesh (1986)

An Italian high school student becomes infatuated with a woman he sees outside his class window. Her fiancée is in jail for being involved in a radical movement, and she spends much time in court providing moral support. At first she resists the student's ...

Henry IV (1984)

Deranged after a fall from a horse, a man has lived for twenty years in a castle laboring under the delusion that he is Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV. His psychiatrist concocts an elaborate scheme to shock him out of his medieval reverie. ...

The Eyes, the Mouth (1982)

A rich Italian's shocking suicide means different things to his twin brother, mother and pregnant lover. ...

Vacation in Val Trebbia (1980)

Director Marco Bellocchio returns with his family to his homeland, in the province of Piacenza. The journey is an opportunity to confront oneself with one's past, as well as with the nostalgia of an era. ...

Mouth Harmonica (1980)

The story of a turbulent relationship between Elisa, a mentally unstable young woman, and her psychiatrist who, meets her after she's hospitalized when she faints in a subway station. He advises her to stay in the hospital, but she wants to feel free. ...

A Leap in the Dark (1980)

Mauro, a judge, is worried about his older sister Marta, who took care of him since he was a boy, and now suffers from mental illness and suicidal thoughts. She seems to recover from her depression when Mauro acquaints her with Giovanni, a brilliant actor ...

The Cinema Machine (1979)

Directed by a group of avant-garde filmmakers, the film is an investigation of the less edifying aspects of film industry. ...

The Seagull (1977)

A young writer is trapped between his awful actress mother and the knowledge that he has only a mediocre talent as a playwright and almost no force of character. ...

Victory March (1976)

The drawbacks and difficulties of military life are explored in this film. Paolo Passeri is a college graduate, somewhat spoiled, somewhat effete, who finds himself in an officer training program under the stern martinet, Captain Asciutto. He gradually bec ...

Fit to Be Untied (1975)

This documentary was distilled from a 3 1/2-hour television film Nessuno o Tutti, to make the point that many inmates now in mental hospitals could be released without harm to society, and to their advantage. ...

Slap the Monster on Page One (1972)

Days before the general election, after a girl from a rich family is murdered in an attempted rape, the editor-in-chief of a conservative tabloid tries to derail the police investigation in order to help the right-wing candidates supported by his bosses. ...

Planet Venus (1972)

Matteo is a communist intellectual, the son of a wealthy bourgeois, who found himself blind from an eye after the war. One day in the streets of Rome he meets Amelia, a child suffocated by the bourgeois environment. ...

In the Name of the Father (1971)

In 1958 Angelo, a rich and spoiled boy, enters a religious school, where students are tired of its vice-rector, and the strict rules and old-fashioned teaching methods of priests. Soon, Angelo exerts strong leadership among his peers and incites turmoil am ...

Love and Anger (1969)

Five short stories with contemporary settings. In New York, people are indifferent to derelicts sleeping on sidewalks, to a woman's assault in front of an apartment building, and to a couple injured in a car crash. A man, stripped of his identity, dies in ...

Long Live the 1st Red and Proletarian May (1969)

Milan, 1 May 1969. A propaganda film produced by the communist organization Servire il popolo. ...

The Calabrian People Raised Their Heads (1969)

A documentary set in Paola, in Calabria, about the fight to occupy housing. ...

China Is Near (1967)

A pair of working class lovers - a secretary and an accountant, scheme to marry into the rich landed gentry. ...

Fists in the Pocket (1965)

A deeply disturbed and epileptic young man benignly decides to murder other members of his dysfunctional family for altruistic reasons. ...

Ginepro Became a Man (1962)

At the centre of the narrative, which continues and deepens the themes of blame and punishment, the fall of a leader, Juniper. ...

Down with Uncle (1962)

Three kids climb over the wall of an old cemetery in the Piacenza countryside and reach a boy their age, who is praying in front of a tomb. Then, they all run out and reach an ancient abandoned cemetery. Here they amuse themselves by destroying votive stat ...

Culpability and Punishment (1961)

For trying to seduce the boss's wife, a young delinquent is punished by gangsters. ...

Volonté: The Man of a Thousand Faces (2024)

A documentary exploring the life and legacy of renowned Italian actor Gian Maria Volonté, featuring insights from his colleagues, family, and never-before-seen footage, highlighting his artistic journey and political activism. ...

Raffa (2023)

An account of the life and artistic career of Raffaella Carrà (1943-2021), Italian pop star and television personality, told through the voices of those who knew her best. ...

Lo Spazio Inquieto (2022)

Behind the Scenes: The Traitor (2022)

Drawing on archives and interviews, including one with Italian director Marco Bellocchio, this is a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the making of his film about reformed mafia member Tommaso Buscetta. ...

Ennio (2022)

A portrait of Ennio Morricone, the most popular and prolific film composer of the 20th century, the one most loved by the international public, a two-time Oscar winner and the author of over five hundred unforgettable scores. ...

Opera Prima (2021)

Opera Prima is a tribute and a journey through the evolution that cinema has had in Italy. Tayu Vlietstra, a pupil of Bertolucci, carries out an investigation on the first work of six of the most authoritative and beloved Italian directors. The result is ...

Journey into the Twilight (2021)

A portrait of Italy in the '60s and '70s, based on films by Marco Bellocchio. ...

Marx Can Wait (2021)

"Marx can wait" was something Camillo Bellocchio said to his twin Marco the last time they met before the former died at a young age in the heated days of 1968. This documentary is dedicated to his memory. ...

Glauber, Claro (2020)

A deep dive into Glauber Rocha's years exiled in Italy in the 70s. Through a collection of interviews and archives, the movie shows the making of his film Claro (1975) and his relation with European auteurs in their filmic and political views. ...

Colpiti al cuore (2019)

La mia casa e i miei coinquilini - Il lungo viaggio di Joyce Lussu (2016)

Marco Bellocchio in his interview with Joyce in 1994 talks about his attitude towards life devoid of dreams and illusions, but extremely active, asking her how it is possible to transmit the extraordinary things that she has lived. Her straw handbag still ...

Filmstudio, mon amour (2015)

Cinema Italiano: Moments of Truth (2014)

Documentary about Italian cinema. ...

Lino Micciché, mio padre - Una visione del mondo (2013)

A documentary focused on film critic Lino Micciché, as seen from the point of view of his friends and his son Francesco. ...

Caro Paolo (2013)

Voi siete qui (2011)

What Do You Know About Me (2009)

Until the 1970s, Italian cinema dominated the international scene, even competing with Hollywood. Then, in just a few years, came its rapid decline, the flight of our greatest producers, a crisis among the best writer-directors, the collapse of production. ...

Franco Cristaldi e il suo cinema Paradiso (2009)

Marcello, una vita dolce (2006)

After shooting to fame with Federico Fellini's "La Dolce Vita" (1960), actor Marcello Mastroianni (1924-1996) starred in more than 160 films in his nearly half-a-century career. Directors Mario Canale and Annarosa Morri look into the melancholic charm of o ...

Filmmakers vs. Tycoons (2005)

How the cinema industry does not respect the author's work as it was conceived, how manipulates the motion pictures in order to make them easier to watch by an undemanding audience or even how mutilates them to adapt the original formats and runtimes to th ...

A Need for Change: The Making of 'Fists in the Pocket' (2005)

Documentary on the making of Marco Bellocchio's first film as a director, 'Fists in the Pocket'. ...

Behind Love and Anger (2005)

Documentary about the anthology film Love and Anger (1969) with interviews with Carlo Lizzani (director of the segment "L'indifferenza"), Marco Bellocchio (director of the segment "Discutiamo, discussamo"), Maurizio Ponzi (assistant director of the segment ...

I nostri trent'anni - Generazioni a confronto (2004)

Various generations of filmmakers talk about what cinema means for them. ...

Same rage, same spring (2003)

A documentary about the making of "Buongiorno, notte" and the films and politics of director Marco Bellocchio. ...

Cesare Zavattini (2003)

Documentary about Italian film screenwriter Cesare Zavattini ...

My Mother's Smile (2002)

A celebrated painter receives a visit from a cardinal's assistant, who informs him that his mother could become a saint. ...

A un millimetro dal cuore (2002)

A strange encounter with an unknown man from a story a harpist tells to his friend during a recording session. ...

My Name Is Anna Magnani (1980)

Traces the life of Anna Magnani, her creations, her successes, her triumphs, her boycotted career, her nonconformism, her anxieties, her generosity ... Punctuated with photos that tell her career in theater and cinema, Extracts of films, this documentary p ...

Vacation in Val Trebbia (1980)

Director Marco Bellocchio returns with his family to his homeland, in the province of Piacenza. The journey is an opportunity to confront oneself with one's past, as well as with the nostalgia of an era. ...

The Cinema Machine (1979)

Directed by a group of avant-garde filmmakers, the film is an investigation of the less edifying aspects of film industry. ...

The Seagull (1977)

A young writer is trapped between his awful actress mother and the knowledge that he has only a mediocre talent as a playwright and almost no force of character. ...

Fit to Be Untied (1975)

This documentary was distilled from a 3 1/2-hour television film Nessuno o Tutti, to make the point that many inmates now in mental hospitals could be released without harm to society, and to their advantage. ...

Tutto in comune (1974)

Slap the Monster on Page One (1972)

Days before the general election, after a girl from a rich family is murdered in an attempted rape, the editor-in-chief of a conservative tabloid tries to derail the police investigation in order to help the right-wing candidates supported by his bosses. ...

Planet Venus (1972)

Matteo is a communist intellectual, the son of a wealthy bourgeois, who found himself blind from an eye after the war. One day in the streets of Rome he meets Amelia, a child suffocated by the bourgeois environment. ...

N.P. - The Secret (1972)

An engineer invents a revolutionary machine capable of automating all industrial production, thereby eliminating the need for human labor. His groundbreaking innovation, intended to free humanity from work, instead leads to his abduction and brainwashing b ...

Love and Anger (1969)

Five short stories with contemporary settings. In New York, people are indifferent to derelicts sleeping on sidewalks, to a woman's assault in front of an apartment building, and to a couple injured in a car crash. A man, stripped of his identity, dies in ...

Cinéma et Réalité (1967)

In this documentary, giants of italian cinema such as Rossellini, De Sica, Fellini and Zavattini talk about the importance of cinema after WW2, and about huge moments of social rebellion. This movie gives the floor to the creators of italian neorealism. ...

Francis of Assisi (1966)

A 1966 biopic of Francis of Assisi presents him as a troubled rebel and champion of radical brotherhood, reflecting the spirit of 1968 student protests. Praised and condemned, the film sparked controversy for its bold, dissenting portrayal of faith. ...