
Franco Cristaldi
Production
Biography
Franco Cristaldi (Turin, 3 October 1924 – Montecarlo, 1 July 1992) was an Italian film producer, credited with producing (or co-producing) feature films from the 1950s to the 1990s. In 1946 Cristaldi founded Vides Cinematografica in Turin. This production company initially produced short and documentary films, and would later be renamed to Cristaldifilm in the 1980s. In the 1950s, Cristaldi changed his attention to feature films and moved to Rome. During his long career, he worked with directors and screenwriters such as Francesco Rosi, Pietro Germi, Mario Monicelli, Federico Fellini, Luchino Visconti, and Giuseppe Tornatore. A noted film producer from some years in his native Italy, some of Cristaldi's most successful films internationally included The Name of the Rose and Nuovo cinema Paradiso. (The former winning a César and two BAFTAs, and the latter winning several BAFTAs, the Grand Prix at Cannes, and Best Foreign Language Film at the 62nd Academy Awards). In 1977 Cristaldi was elected president of the International Federation of Film Producers Associations, and was a member of the jury at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival. Cristaldi was born in Turin, Italy in 1924, and studied at university for a time before focusing his interests on cinema. He was first married to Carla Simonetti with whom he had a son, Massimo. He applied to the Vatican to have this marriage annulled, and from 1966 lived with actress Claudia Cardinale. Cristaldi claimed to have married Cardinale, but she refuted this, saying he threw a marriage party, without ever officially marrying her. He mentored Cardinale through her own film career, producing many of her films, until their separation in 1975. In 1983, he married Eritrean actress Zeudi Araya, who starred in several Cristaldi-produced films. Franco Cristaldi died in Montecarlo in 1992, survived by his wife Zeudi, son Massimo, and adopted son Patrick, the son of Claudia Cardinale. Source: Article "Franco Cristaldi" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
Known For

A filmmaker recalls his childhood, when he fell in love with the movies at his village's theater and formed a deep friendship with the theater's projectionist.
Cinema Paradiso

The life of the 13th-century Venetian explorer who sought to connect the civilizations of China and Europe through trade.
Marco Polo

14th-century Franciscan monk William of Baskerville and his young novice arrive at a conference to find that several monks have been murdered under mysterious circumstances. To solve the crimes, William must rise up against the Church's authority and fight the shadowy conspiracy of monastery monks using only his intelligence; which is considerable.
The Name of the Rose

In an Italian seaside town, young Titta gets into trouble with his friends and watches various local eccentrics as they engage in often absurd behavior. Frequently clashing with his stern father and defended by his doting mother, Titta witnesses the actions of a wide range of characters, from his extended family to Fascist loyalists to sensual women, with certain moments shifting into fantastical scenarios.
Amarcord

Torn by personal guilt, Italian General Umberto Nobile reminisces about his 1928 failed Arctic expedition aboard the airship Italia.
The Red Tent

Four episodes. A pilot is ready to change sex, but the doctor made an error. A woman is searching a partner for a dance contest. A worker seduce his boss wife. A guard is too much proactive and this will cause many troubles.
Di che segno sei?

Ferdinando Cefalù is desperate to marry his cousin, Angela, but he is married to Rosalia and divorce is illegal in Italy. To get around the law, he tries to trick his wife into having an affair so he can catch her and murder her, as he knows he would be given a light sentence for killing an adulterous woman. He persuades a painter to lure his wife into an affair, but Rosalia proves to be more faithful than he expected.
Divorce Italian Style

A shipwreck strands a modern Italian businessman on a desert island. Like Robinson Crusoe he must find a way to return to civilization; unlike him--he's a 20th-century man, a totally different case.
Mr. Robinson

Best friends Peppe and Mario are thieves, but they're not very good at it. Still, Peppe thinks that he's finally devised a master heist that will make them rich. With the help of some fellow criminals, he plans to dig a tunnel from a rented apartment to the pawnshop next door, where they can rob the safe. But his plan is far from foolproof, and the fact that no one in the group has any experience digging tunnels proves to be the least of their problems.
Big Deal on Madonna Street

A middle-aged man meets a young woman who is waiting on a canal bridge for her lover's return.
Le Notti Bianche

Enrico Mattei helped change Italy’s future, first as freedom-fighter against the Nazis, then as an investor in methane gas through a public company, A.G.I.P., and ultimately as the head of ENI, a state body formed for the development of oil resources. On October 27, 1962, he died when his private airplane crashed during a flight to Milan. Officially, it is declared an accident, but many journalists explore other plausible reasons for Mattei's untimely death.
The Mattei Affair

Lucky Luciano is one of the bosses of the Mafia. He orders the slaughter of 40 other responsibles, therefore becoming the only boss. But a few years later he is put into jail. In 1946, he got a pardon and is sent back to Sicilia. There, he begins becoming one of the chief of the Mafia. The US Army seems to refrain from interfering.
Lucky Luciano

In 1914, a cruise ship sets sail from Naples to spread the ashes of beloved opera singer Edmea Tetua near Erimo, the isle of her birth. During the voyage, the eclectic array of passengers discovers a group of Serbian refugees aboard the vessel. Peace and camaraderie abound until the ship is descended upon by an Austrian flagship. The Serbians are forced to board it, but naturally they resist, igniting a skirmish that ends in destruction.
And the Ship Sails On

The wife of an accused murderer embarks on a dangerous masquerade to find the real culprit behind a dancer's death.
Come Dance with Me!

A penniless countess falls in love with a cad, unaware that he is also involved on the side with her beautiful daughter.
Time of Indifference

The film presents the tale of Agnese Ascalone, daughter of prominent miner Vincenzo Ascalone, and takes place in a small town in Sicily. Agnese is seduced by her sister Matilde's fiancé, and has a tryst with him for which she confesses and tries to repent, only to be discovered by her mother and father.
Seduced and Abandoned

In the late 19th century, a former high school teacher turned unionist tries to organize workers laboring with inhuman conditions at a textile factory in Turin, Italy.
The Organizer

Suave antiques dealer Alfredo Martelli is picked up by the police with no justification. At the precinct, Martelli realizes what the investigation is all about-- that he is the main suspect in the killing of his wealthy ex-lover. Is he guilty, or is he just a sleaze?
The Assassin

At the end of World War II, shallow, self-centered Mara is the prettiest girl in her small Italian village; Bebo is a Communist partisan who is finding it difficult to adjust to the dull banalities of life in peacetime. When Mara’s father, a passionate Communist, declares that his daughter will marry the returning hero, her reactions range from joy to bitter resentment.
Bebo's Girl

Krios, the youngest of the Titans, may be the least strong of the seven brothers whose strength comes from their mother, earth-goddess Gaia, but is by far the smartest, and thus their natural leader. He arrives on Crete, the kingdom of the mighty king Minos, impresses him as gladiator, gains his trust, falls in love with a mortal girl and discovers both Minos's human sacrifice-cult and a foreign conspiracy to seize power with a hidden army.