The film shows how Italy's historic national hero Giuseppe Garibaldi (embodied by Renzo Ricci) leads a military campaign known as Expedition of the Thousand in 1860 and conquers Sicily and Naples. When the Bourbon monarchy has left Southern Italy, he supports Victor Emmanuel II of Italy who achieves a lasting unification under the aegis the House of Savoy.
Roberto Rossellini stated he was very more proud of this film than of any other film he ever made.
Synopsis
A sudden gunshot destroys the dream of two lovers. The fate of Orpheus and Eurydice is a cruel one. On their wedding day, her soul is kidnapped and taken down into the Netherworld. Under a metaphysical sky Charon, the taxi driver, waits for the crime to be committed.
COMMENTARY
The movie is an opera-musical with an immersive and transmedial language. The myth is transposed into the contemporary age: Charon is a taxi driver and we go from Paris half under water to the stage of the Teatro Regio in Turin, in a play of musical references that range from Puccini to Händel, from Verdi to Gluck, from Vivaldi to Frankie Goes to Hollywood. And the images fuse words, lyric opera, fashion and the visual arts, between the real and the virtual.
DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT
We created an unexpected encounter between acting and lyric opera, between pop, special effects and images filled with symbolism. Bringing into a cast of extraordinary actors such as Vincent Cassel, Fanny Ardant and Rossy De Palma two young artists selected among hundreds of lyric opera singers: Valentino Buzza and Mariam Battistelli.