A committee comprised of 9 people from Italy that I’ve never heard of made a wise decision; Paolo Sorrentino’s ‘La Grande Bellezza’ (The Great Beauty) will be Italy’s film to be considered for Best Foreign Film.
This doesn’t mean that it will be nominated; we’ll have to wait until January 16 to hear the 5 final films for the category, but this year I’m very hopeful. The Great Beauty stars Toni Servillo, Carlo Verdone, and Sabrina Ferelli and this year all three of them won David di Donatello awards, the Italian equivalent of the Academy Awards. La Grande Bellezza premiered in competition at the Cannes Film Festival.
The film also stars the city of Rome, and I’ve heard that The Great Beauty is not its most flattering part. While Woody Allen tried to film a love letter to the eternal city in ‘To Rome With Love’, Sorrentino’s seems more of a death knell.
Sorrentino wrote the screenplay and directed this film and I’ll finally get the chance to see it when the DVD comes out in Italy October 23. I’ve preordered my copy from ibs.it.
I Love Italian Everything 