Amleto Novelli
Filippo Derblay, a young man of humble birth, became, thanks to his job, the owner of the ironworks. He is secretly in love with Clara, the daughter of the Marquis of Beaulieu, who lost all his fortune. Clara is engaged to the Duke of Bligny, a vain cousin of her. After learning of Clara’s financial disgrace, the Duke prefers to engage to Atenaide Moulinet, a social climber and daughter of the industrialist Moulinet, the “King of Cacao”. To get revenge, Clara agrees to marry Filippo Derblay, despite she considers him an upstart and she despises him. But Filippo, who loves her deeply, can’t tolerate to be humiliated, will prove how much her prejudice was wrong and, at the end, he will win her love. Among the most captivating aspects of the film, the intense performance of the great diva Pina Menichelli and the high level of the photography, that captures spaces from life as the remarkable images of the factory and the workers at the machinery.
Marina di Malombra (Borelli) lives in a castle prior to her wedding. She begins to read letters written by an ancestor called Cecilia. She finds out that Cecilia was driven to her death by her uncle. Marina identifies with Cecilia and take revenge on her behalf by murdering her uncle. After she has done this, Marina commits suicide.
“Madame Tallien” (1916) depicts the libertine life and loves of the eponymous decadent aristocrat, an important activist who was ahead of her time in deciding to make both love and war before, during and after the French Revolution . She even caused Robespierre to lose his head (literally) because of her.
The film CHRISTUS was released in 1916, it is a silent movie which tells the story of the life of Christ from the Virgin Mary’s visit from the angels telling of his coming, to his birth and through his early life and onto to his betrayal by Judas, the crucifixion and his resurrection and his ascension to the Kingdom of Heaven. The film is divided into three segments which are referred to as mysteries. The first of these includes the birth of Jesus, the Magi, Herod and the slaughter of the innocents, the escape to Egypt and Pilate. The second part takes in the preaching of the Jordan, the expulsion of the merchants from the Temple, the adulteress and his entry into Jerusalem. The third Mystery, is itself then divided into three separate parts, which are The Passion, The Death and The Resurrection.
Based loosely on Shakespeare's play, Plutarch's "Life of Antony", and Pietro Cossa's dramatic poem, "Cleopatra", this movie was spectacular for its time. It offers location shots made in Italy and Egypt, large crowd scenes (e.g., the Roman army embarking in Alexandria), lots of emotional drama (Marc Antony & Cleopatra, his wife Octavia, sister of Antony's rival Octavian, unhistorically coming to Alexandria to beg him to return to her, and some mean, mean looks exchanged between Octavia and Cleopatra.
"Quo Vadis?" was a landmark in early Italian historical epic films, and certainly Enrico Guazzoni’s grand scale masterpiece laid the foundations for what genuine colossal Italian spectacles should be. It had a great deal of influence on Giovanni Pastrone’s "Cabiria" (1914) and D.W. Griffith’s "Intolerance" (1916).
