50th Anniversary Screening of Bertolucci’s Historical Epic ‘Novecento’
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Besides De Niro, the film’s stellar cast also comprised Gérard Depardieu, Burt Lancaster, Dominique Sanda and Donald Sutherland.
The special two-part screening, being held in Piazza San Cosimato in Rome’s Trastevere neighborhood, is the grand finale of the Eternal City’s Il Vinema in Piazza summer screenings series. The event is run by Fondazione Piccolo America, the feisty group of young film buffs headed by Valerio Carocci that have been shaking things up for years after occupying the nearby shuttered Cinema America movie theater.
Novecento depicts half a century of Italian history through the parallel lives of two childhood friends born on the same day in 1900 in central Italian Emilia Romagna region countryside.
Alfredo, heir to a wealthy landowning family (played by De Niro), and Olmo, a Communist farm laborer’s son (Depardieu).
Thousands of extras were also employed by the production, some of whom were real farm laborers.
Paramount was worried about the length of the film — five hours and 20 minutes — which became an acrimonious battle.
He has jokingly recounted, Coppola promised to make “Apocalypse Now” one-minute longer than “Novecento,” which he did not manage to do!
The first part of “Novecento” screened in Piazza San Cosimato on July 13. The second part screen toaday, July 14.
