(ANSA) - Venice, May 10 - Italian director and screenwriter
Francesco Rosi will receive the Golden Lion for career
achievement at the Venice Film Festival later this year,
organiser said Thursday.
Naples-born Rosi, 89, is best known for films exposing
political intrigue and corruption, the mafia and social issues.
They include Salvatore Giuliano (1962), Hands on the City
(1963), The Mattei Case (1972), Lucky Luciano (1973) and Christ
Stopped at Eboli (1979).
The Venice fest runs from August 29 to September 8.
(ANSA) - Naples, May 4 - Maurizio Marinella is a busy man.
He's in his shop, which sells the firm's handmade signature
ties on Naples' waterfront, by around 6:30 in the morning and if
you want to talk to him, you have to be an early bird.
"Call between 7:00 and 7:30," a sales associate in his
Milan store said when asked about interviews.
The store opens so early because it is no ordinary clothes
store.
(ANSA) - Paris, April 19 - Italian director Matteo Garrone is
bidding for more success at Cannes with Reality, a comedy about
a Neapolitan fishmonger hoping to take part in Big Brother.
Garrone, who won second prize at the French film festival in
2008 with Gomorrah, an adaptation of Roberto Saviano's
Neapolitan mafia expose', is the only Italian in competition,
organisers said Thursday.
"It's a great opportunity and a beautiful adventure,"
Garrone told ANSA on hearing the news.
(ANSA) - Rome, April 13 - American film director Woody Allen
had the world premiere for his new film, To Rome with Love, in
the Italian capital Friday where he called the movie an homage
to classic Italian cinema.
"I have always been an enormous admirer of Italian cinema,"
said Allen. "Anything that happens in the movie that is redolent
of Italian cinema is simply something that I have absorbed
through osmosis over the years".
(ANSA) - Verona, April 13 - An Italian clown has become the
first foreign hire by Moscow's Bolshoi circus since the 1917
Russian revolution.
David Larible from Verona, the seventh generation of a
family of circus performers, is considered one of the greatest
entertainers in the clown world today.
Larible, whose stint in the Russian big-top world ends
April 16, has worked with US Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey
Circus and the Cirque de Montecarlo.
(ANSA) - Milan, April 12 - The Constitutional Court said
Thursday it would have been unconstitutional to move a trial in
which former premier Silvio Berlusconi is accused of paying an
underage Moroccan-born runaway and belly dancer known
as Ruby for sex.
In a statement explaning its decision in February to keep
Berlusconi's hearings in Milan, the court said it was
"constitutionally obligated" to do so.
(ANSA) - Rome, April 12 - The Italian Treasury sold 4.8
billion euros worth of three-year bonds, lower than the
five-billion-euro target set for Thursday, as borrowing costs
shot up again.
"We do not have the urgency to raise funding at current
high borrowing rates," Junior Economy Minister Vittorio Grilli
said, explaining that the Treasury had deliberately opted not to
sell all the bonds.
The spread between Italian and German 10-year bonds dropped
to 357.3 points compared to Wednesday's 375.3, with the yield at
5.38% compared to 5.53% on Wednesday.
(ANSA) - Naples, April 11 - An Italian answer to London's
Savile Row, 'Savile Alley' is a collection of storied
bespoke-tailoring houses dotting the narrow central streets of
Naples.
Harking back to the city's aristocratic traditions as a
European powerhouse to rival Paris and London, the boutiques are
proud to tell visitors they have everything the discriminating
gentleman needs to step out about town.
"We take care of all a man's needs, from head to toe," says
Ugo Cilento of the 'Cilento 1780' emporium.
(ANSA) - Rome, October 21- After launching a social media
campaign that went viral, Italian singing legend Mina has found
the author of a mysterious demo that made its way into her hands
and onto her upcoming album.
Paolo Limiti wrote the lyrics and Mario Nobile composed the
music, according to the artist's website, which just days ago
invited fans to listen to the mastered track sung by Mina and
accompanied by an animated video that narrates the mysterious
origins of the song.
In just three days the video went viral and received 80,000
views.
(ANSA) - Rome, October 20 - French first lady Carla Bruni
has given birth to a baby girl.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy's Italian wife gave birth
in a Paris clinic at around 8pm on Wednesday, French media
reported.
Sarkozy reportedly was not present at the birth but came
to visit Bruni and their new child late on Wednesday.
The 43-year-old mother, a former singer and model, has a
10-year-old son from a previous relationship and the president
has three sons from his two previous marriages.
(ANSA) - Rome, October 18 - Like Prince Charming looking for
the owner of the glass slipper, reclusive Italian singing legend
Mina launched a social media campaign Tuesday to identify who
wrote a song on her upcoming album.
The demo, entitled This Song (Questa Canzone), was sent to
the pop superstar without a name or return address, yet made its
way onto her new album set for release in November.
(ANSA) - Milan, October 13 - Famed Argentinian-Israeli
conductor Daniel Barenboim was on Thursday named musical
director of Milan's iconic La Scala opera house, filling a post
left vacant when Riccardo Muti stormed out in 2005 amid artistic
differences.
Barenboim, 68, who is already principal guest conductor for
La Scala, will assume his new post on December 1, La Scala said.
For the last five years Barenboim has been Maestro of La
Scala, a less formal title under which he has produced at least
two operas a year. This arrangement was due to lapse this year.
(ANSA) - Venice, October 7 - Longtime advertising chief
Giulio Malgara has been named the new president of the Venice
Biennale, the Ministry of Culture has announced.
Malgara, from Milan, has headed Italy's advertisers' body
UPA for the past 23 years. He is also a founder and current
president of Auditel, the Italian ratings agency.
"I'm taking on the challenge with great passion", said
Malgara, 74. "There will be a lot to work on".
(ANSA) - Rome, September 29 - One of Italy's famous fashion
names, Santo Versace, on Thursday said he had quit Prime
Minister Silvio Berlusconi's party after his coalition's
decision to back a minister with alleged links to the mafia .
"This morning I left the PDL (People of Freedom party). It
is my birthday gift to Berlusconi," Versace said in an interview
with state broadcaster Radio Due.
He was referring to Berlusconi's 75th birthday on Thursday.
(ANSA) - Rome, September 28 - Terraferma by Emanuele
Crialese will be Italy's contender for
the 2012 Best Foreign Film Oscar, a jury decided Wednesday.
The Roman director's film, about a family of Sicilian
fishermen dealing with the influx of migrants, was chosen over
seven movies including Nanni Moretti's Habemus Papam and
Giuseppe Gagliardi's Tatanka.
Crialese's fourth feature, Terraferma won the Special Jury
Prize at the 2011 Venice Film Festival earlier this month.
