Alberto Pasquali

A woman wears a turtle pendant as a sign of how she keeps her distance from men and marriage.

Frate Francesco/The Passion of St. Francis (1927) aka Santo Francesco was the third Italian film on the life of Saint Francis of Assisi. St. Francis, or Santo Francesco in Italian, was played by Alberto Pasquali, and the film was directed by Giulio Antamoro.

Antamoro's CHRISTUS, epic in scale and ambition, and featuring decidedly otherworldly special effects, was released in 1916. Telling the story of the Life of Christ, the film is divided into three segments-- three Mysteries. The first of these includes the Birth of Jesus, the arrival of the Magi, Herod and the slaughter of the innocents, the flight into Egypt. The second Mystery features the expulsion of the merchants from the Temple, Mary Magdalene's conversion and Christ's entry into Jerusalem. The third Mystery is itself divided into three separate parts, which are The Passion, The Death and The Resurrection.

Le mogli e le arance is characterized by a wonderful sereneness. It is the kind of quietude which many of us connect immediately with the south. Everything seems to be in its perfect place, and time is just passing. In the setting of a sanatorium a nobleman is practicing idleness and slow-motion mind games. Does it sound boring? Yes, it does. But it is not, the uneventfulness is definitively enthralling. The film director tries to narrate time, time itself, as such, for its own sake: a rare experiment.

The story of this Renaissance genius, from his apprenticeship to his last years at the Château du Clos-Lucé in Amboise, including his meeting with Mona Lisa.

German silent film directed by Mario Bonnard and starring Marcella Albani, Ralph Arthur Roberts and Curt Bois.