The Power of the Past

A graphic portrayal of the last twelve hours of Jesus of Nazareth's life.

The story of Michael Berg, a German lawyer who, as a teenager in the late 1950s, had an affair with an older woman, Hanna, who then disappeared only to resurface years later as one of the defendants in a war crimes trial stemming from her actions as a concentration camp guard late in the war. He alone realizes that Hanna is illiterate and may be concealing that fact at the expense of her freedom.

Tom Ripley is a calculating young man who believes it's better to be a fake somebody than a real nobody. Opportunity knocks in the form of a wealthy U.S. shipbuilder who hires Tom to travel to Italy to bring back his playboy son, Dickie. Ripley worms his way into the idyllic lives of Dickie and his girlfriend, plunging into a daring scheme of duplicity, lies and murder.

In April of 1945, Germany stands at the brink of defeat with the Russian Army closing in from the east and the Allied Expeditionary Force attacking from the west. In Berlin, capital of the Third Reich, Adolf Hitler proclaims that Germany will still achieve victory and orders his generals and advisers to fight to the last man. When the end finally does come, and Hitler lies dead by his own hand, what is left of his military must find a way to end the killing that is the Battle of Berlin, and lay down their arms in surrender.

Heidi, is an eight-year-old Swiss orphan who is given by her aunt to her mountain-dwelling grandfather. She is then stolen back by her aunt from her grandfather to live in the wealthy Sesemann household in Frankfurt, Germany as a companion to Klara, a sheltered, disabled girl in a wheelchair. Heidi is unhappy but makes the best of the situation, always longing for her grandfather.

A real estate agent leaves behind his beautiful wife to go to Transylvania to visit the mysterious Count Dracula and formalize the purchase of a property in Wismar.

Two angels, Damiel and Cassiel, glide through the streets of Berlin, observing the bustling population, providing invisible rays of hope to the distressed but never interacting with them. When Damiel falls in love with lonely trapeze artist Marion, the angel longs to experience life in the physical world, and finds — with some words of wisdom from actor Peter Falk — that it might be possible for him to take human form.

Failed architect, engineer and vicious murderer Jack narrates the details of some of his most elaborately orchestrated crimes, each of them a towering piece of art that defines his life's work as a serial killer for twelve years.

A lawyer finds himself in far over his head when he attempts to get involved in drug trafficking.

When German police viciously quell a protest against the shah of Iran, popular journalist Ulrike Meinhof rebels against her dishonest marriage, walks away from her children and joins radical anarchist Andreas Baader. Together with Baader's girlfriend, Gudrun Ensslin, they form the violent Red Faction Army, and together perpetrate a slew of terrorist attacks as a way of disrupting the fabric of what they see as an increasingly fascist state.

Jimi, a computer game designer, finds that his latest product has been infected by a virus which has given consciousness to the main character of the game, Solo. Tormented by the memory of his fled girlfriend Lisa and begged by Solo to end its useless "life", Jimi begins a search for people who can help him both to discover what happened to Lisa and to delete his game before it is released.

A sea captain makes a bet in a cafe with a friend that he will marry the first woman who walks in.

Paralyzed from a crash, Nicola falls for his physiotherapist Lucia. Franco and Manuela seek fertility treatment in Barcelona. Filippo and Fosco, a gay couple, plan their wedding. Ernesto, a waiter, has an affair with Spanish cook Cecilia.

A portrait of Austrian artist Gustav Klimt whose lavish, sexual paintings came to symbolize the art nouveau style of the late 19th and early 20th century.

A young man falls in love with extra-liberated Giulia. Their relationship becomes very passionate, but Giulia has no limits in her sexual fantasies and games. Poor guy, will soon discover he'll have to pay a price for Giulia. He'll have to put up with all her strange and pervert desires, until of course he reaches his limits.

Dive into the Eternal City – see Rome like you’ve never seen it before. Storefront robberies, bizarre murders, career dreamers, and cameos from Italy's foremost directors and actors feature in this star-studded omnibus tale about life and love.

Famous writer Onoff is now a recluse. The Inspector is suspicious when Onoff is brought into the station one night, disoriented and suffering a kind of amnesia. In an isolated, rural police station, the Inspector tries to establish the events surrounding a killing, to reach a startling resolution.

Four intertwined stories on the joys and sorrows of love.

Six vignettes explore love and desire in Rome, from prostitution and heartache to unwed motherhood and the male gaze.

Antonio is a fallen angel, a rootless chauffeur who relates only to the lonely heroes in the science fiction novels he grew up with. Only through a chance meeting with Maria, a woman struggling to hold onto her daughter and her business, does he discover a hope that's been in his detached existence.

Giacinto Rossi, a poor driver up to his neck in debt, is imprisoned for simulated crime. He finds himself in a cell with Tagliabue, an unscrupulous murderer; Sorcio, an elderly thief; and Papaleo, an honor-obsessed intellectual who murdered his fiancée's lover. Giacinto is forced by the three men to make a daring escape from prison.

Toni leads a normal life with his wife Paola but full of enthusiasm and passion. The chance meeting with the young and wealthy Chiara will rekindle in him the desire to redeem himself and to realize his secret dream: to become an artist. The paths of the three will intertwine in a dangerous love triangle that will change the course of their lives forever.

A relationship develops between seasoned actor Stefano and his young, ambitious co-star Laura when they are cast as the two leads in a film. Stefano must deal with his growing jealousy when Laura's career begins to take off.

In WWII, Lieut. Martino and his men are assigned to lead a group of prostitutes through the mountainous ways to serve in brothels for Italian soldiers in Albania.

In autumn of 1526, the Emperor, Charles V, sends his German landsknechts led by Georg von Frundsberg to march towards Rome. The inferior papal armies, commanded by Giovanni de'Medici, try to chase them in the midst of a harsh winter. Nevertheless, the Imperial armies manage to cross the rivers along their march and get cannons thanks to the maneuvers of its Lords. In a skirmish, Giovanni de'Medici is wounded in the leg by a falconet shot. The attempts to cure him fail and he dies. The Imperial armies assault Rome. The film is beautifully but unassumingly set, and shows the hard conditions in which war is waged and its lack of glory. It ends straightforwardly with the declaration made after the death of Giovanni de'Medici by the commanders of the armies in Europe of not using again fire weapons because of their cruelty.

St. Petersburg, 1860. After a member of the imperial family is assassinated, Fyodor Dostoevsky meets one of the conspirators, who reveals that his comrades are planning another attack to the Tsar's life. Plagued by debts and struggling to finish his latest novel, Dostoevsky must act fast to call off the plot.

A tale on the Italian upper class of the '60s and their ways to kill time.

September the 8th 1943, Rome, day of the armistice. Danilo escapes the fascist enlist, while Michele succeeded to leave his administration moving from Rome. On the way to come back Rome the two meets Gino and all together will try to pass trough the Gothic Line.

At a wedding party involving three beautiful women, a young man should choose the most charming. But a professor intervenes to prevent the verdict, remembering the troubles caused by Paris in a similar situation.

The lively goings-on of a modern family seen trough the eyes of a young girl just about to receive her first Communion.

In 1938 Italy, after Jews are banned from public life, fascist-abiding restaurateur Luciano nonetheless believes he can still live by his own rules. Everything changes when Anna, a girl with a dangerous secret, begins working at his business.

Italy, September 1943. After the armistice and the flight of the King, the war theaters of the North-East see the advance of Tito's partisans. At the center of the story, in this dramatic historical context, the figure of Norma Cossetto, a young Istrian student, barbarously raped, killed and thrown into a foiba by the Tito partisans.

In 1st century BC Palestine, Joseph is a carpenter who wants to travel and see the world, but destiny makes him meet young Mary. The two fall in love and marry. One day, Mary becomes pregnant and tells Joseph an unbelievable truth... He decides to stay on her side, but things won't be easy.

Between Turin and Pisa unfolds the life of a socially and professionally successful university professor of law. Endowed with great intelligence and an elusive charm, the man and the professor lead a “withdrawn” existence that occasionally borders on the beds of casual lovers. Determined to control reality and keep it carefully at arm's length, he becomes involved despite himself in the suicide death of a student. The boy, obsessed with the professor's life, has painstakingly recorded his lectures, his behavior, his habits...

A man awakens from a coma, only to discover that someone has taken on his identity and that no one, (not even his wife), believes him. With the help of a young woman, he sets out to prove who he is.

Years after his squad was ambushed during the Gulf War, Major Ben Marco finds himself having terrible nightmares. He begins to doubt that his fellow squad-mate Sergeant Raymond Shaw, now a vice-presidential candidate, is the hero he remembers him being. As Marco's doubts deepen, Shaw's political power grows, and, when Marco finds a mysterious implant embedded in his back, the memory of what really happened begins to return.

Momo is a young orphan girl who lives in the ruins of an old Roman amphitheater and becomes friends with everybody in the neighborhood. But when a powerful international corporation starts stealing everybody’s time, nobody has any time left for her, let alone their friends or families. Momo, together with Master Hora, the custodian of time, are the only ones who can go up against the time thieves before all is lost forever.

During a spree of violent killings, a young woman writing a thesis in criminology begins to suspect that her new boyfriend, who is a forensic pathologist, might be a serial killer.

A young lawyer returns home and discovers that a man has committed suicide jumping through a window of his house. His wife, Maria, says that she let the unknown man enter because he said the lawyer was the only one who could help him. Bernardo start to investigate about the man and about the reasons of his suicide.

This is the (funny) story of four agents of Roma traffic police in the '50s. Their life are crossed in affairs that often retire from mere job relationships. 'Guardia scelta' (special agent) Giuseppe tries to be a composer, he wants to write the anthem for the roman traffic police. 'Guardia'(agent) Alberto Randolfi has a too strong inclination to fine everyone and is dreaming about learning French. 'Brigadiere' (sergeant) Pietro Spaziali is busy looking at his little son Tonino and daughter Maria who is going to marry a boxer. The 'Maresciallo' (Marshal) tries to manage and solve all the troubles they often do.

Eugene, a young nobleman, asks two penniless idlers to impersonate his noble relatives to help him marry Gemma, the daughter of an enriched cook.

Claudia is married with Giovanni, a rather dull type. Meek Giacomo is happily divorced, until he meets her. Aldo is a colorful cabbie with whom she had an affair. Who'll win her heart?

The back-in-time misadventures of Walter and Ascanio are not finished. The defective time-travel machine will bring them from prehistory all the way to outer space, in a funny, light-hearted trip across the time.

Mariana and Domenico are on the run from her jealous boyfriend who just happens to be an over-jealous professional football player.

The first movie directed by Roberto Benigni in four surreal short stories: "Durante Cristo" (During Christ), "Angelo" (Angel), , "In Banca" (At the Bank) and "I Due Militi" (The Two Soldiers). An excursus in Benigni's satirical views on man, religion and society.