Italian movies to get jazzed for Italy

The Visions Series - Ricks Series.

Gladiator has great computer Gen on what the Colosseum could have looked like with the Sails over the top to shade.

Violent but showed some good idea of life is the HBO series "Rome" their sets and costumes were amazing.

Just type in Italy in Netflix and you'll find a good mix of old and new.

Go to this link for Rick's recommended reading and viewing for his Italy tours:

http://tours.ricksteves.com/tours08/ITA/reading.cfm/rurl/code/ITA/

thanks DD and Dean. I got the Visions of Italy DVD and was really disappointed, nice if all you plan on doing is flying over head. I will rent the HBO Rome series, my history major son is a big fan of that. I have watched many of the ETBD Italy videos, both old and new. I like older movies too, like Roman Holiday with Audrey Hepburn. And I absolutely plan on watching La Dolce Vita.
Thanks!

"a Little Romance","Life is Beautiful","Godfather II and III", "Fellini Satyrion", "Houseboat","La Strada","The Italian Job","A Room with a View","The English Patient","The Talented Mr.Ripley",""Tea with Mussolini","The Agony and the Ecstasy","Only You", "Nurse Betty","Cleopatra","Spartacus","Ben Hur","Portrait of a Lady","3 Coins in a Fountain","The Last Kiss","Summertime","Death in Venice","Chasing Liberty","Bread and Tulips","Lizzie McGuire Movie","A Month by the Lake","When in Rome","My House in Umbria"...I know I'll probably come up with more. Movies are a great way to learn to appreciate history and culture before a trip!

I recommend "Two Women". My little sis recommends "Cinema Paradiso". Both films are in italian with subtitles.

Oh oh! This is a subject I love!

I either rented these from Netflix or I checked them out from my local library.

The ones I highly recommend:

Cinema Paradiso

Il Postino (The Postman)

Malena

La Stanza Del Figlio (the Son's Room)

Bread and Tulips

I enjoy the three films by Ferzan Ozpetek (they are very modern and have some complexity):

His Secret Life
Facing Windows
Cuore Sacro (Sacred Heart)

Here are some others, though I know everyone has different taste in movies:

Caterina in the Big City

L'Ultimo Bacio (The Last Kiss...I do NOT recommend the Americanized version...bleah!)

Remember Me, My Love

Meglio gioventù (The Best of Youth)

Io Non Ho Paura (I'm Not Scared)

Everybody's Fine

Ferdinando e Carolina

Johnny Stecchino

Not of this World

Sorriso di mia madre (My mother's smile)

Respiro

L'uomo delle stella (The Star Maker)

Also, PBS did an excellent documentary about the Medici. I rented it from the library.

http://www.pbs.org/empires/medici/

And sorry...in my above message, the system squished together some of the movie titles.

3 Coins in the Fountain and Roman Holiday. Absolute classics. You can stay in the apartment block that Gregory Peck lives in in Rome. I did on my last visit and it's still just like it is in the movie!

Ditto Roman Holiday. On IMDB.com you can search by filming location (http://www.imdb.com/LocationTree?Italy). I watched all the movies AFTER my trip, which made it even better ("ooh, I've been there!")

thanks everybody, I really hit a chord here! glad to know I am not alone in priming the pump with some movies! Ciao!

In addition to all the above, the WWII move "A Walk in the Sun", all Italy based. Also the segments in the movie "Patton", from where Monty and Patton are in north africa planning the Sicily invasion, through to end of Sicily campaign, then to just after the end of the campaign where Patton is living in a big villa. I particularly liked the scene where they look down in the distance and see a long column of tank and artillery CRAWLING up a serpentine road. One thing that was not realistic in the Patton movie was the the lack of sweat, considering they were in Sicily in July and August.

1) Tea with Mussolini; (2) Two Women; (3) Life is Beautiful. All take place during WWII and were filmed in different parts of Italy. Life is Beautiful was filmed in Arezzo; a walk through that town takes you past posters illustrating the scenes taken at places you are seeing.