
Directing
Renato Castellani
Born — Died
1913-09-04 — 1985-12-28
Place of birth
Finale Ligure, Liguria, Italy
Known for
Directing
Credits
42 titles
Renato Castellani (4 September 1913 – 28 December 1985) was an Italian film director and screenwriter. Son of a representative of Kodak, he was born in Varigotti, at the time a hamlet of Final Pia, which became Finale Ligure (Savona) in 1927, where his mother had returned from Argentina to give birth to his son. He spent his childhood in Argentina, in the city of Rosario. After 12 years, he returned to Liguria and resumed his studies in Genoa. He moved to Milan, where he graduated from the Polytechnic University in architecture. In Milan he met Livio Castiglioni and together they aired for GUF (Fascist University Group) L'ora radiofonica and La fontana malata by Aldo Palazzeschi, experiment…
Known for
7.7During the bombing of Naples in World War II, a cynical businessman helps a naive prostitute, who spends the next two decades desperate to have him reciprocate her feelings.
Marriage Italian Style
1964
4.7A glamorous female singer Zazà has an affair with a passerby engineer Dufresne. But when Zazà impatiently comes to him in Paris she finds out that he is married and even has a daughter. He wants to escape from his relatives with Zazà, but, disillusioned and exhausted, she rejects his proposition and insists on his coming back to his family.
Zazà
1944
6.5In this documentary, giants of italian cinema such as Rossellini, De Sica, Fellini and Zavattini talk about the importance of cinema after WW2, and about huge moments of social rebellion. This movie gives the floor to the creators of italian neorealism.
Cinéma et Réalité
1967
7.0In regional Sicily, Jana tries to repair her sister's marriage by going to a sorceress who makes up a love potion that will bring about the couple's happiness. But the spell only works on Jana herself...
Malìa
1946
5.8The rich banker Rosen of Livorno fear that the Bonapartist will take all his gold, so he is hiding it inside a cuckoo clock.
The Cuckoo Clock
1938
6.2Pasquale and Maria, husband and wife, live in a palace supposedly haunted by ghosts and pay no rent. When Pasquale finds some food in the cupboard he thinks the ghosts are at work.
Ghosts, Italian Style
1967
Film credits
1970s · 1 titles
Behind the camera
7.7During the bombing of Naples in World War II, a cynical businessman helps a naive prostitute, who spends the next two decades desperate to have him reciprocate her feelings.
Marriage Italian Style
1964
4.7A glamorous female singer Zazà has an affair with a passerby engineer Dufresne. But when Zazà impatiently comes to him in Paris she finds out that he is married and even has a daughter. He wants to escape from his relatives with Zazà, but, disillusioned and exhausted, she rejects his proposition and insists on his coming back to his family.
Zazà
1944
4.7A glamorous female singer Zazà has an affair with a passerby engineer Dufresne. But when Zazà impatiently comes to him in Paris she finds out that he is married and even has a daughter. He wants to escape from his relatives with Zazà, but, disillusioned and exhausted, she rejects his proposition and insists on his coming back to his family.
Zazà
1944
7.0In regional Sicily, Jana tries to repair her sister's marriage by going to a sorceress who makes up a love potion that will bring about the couple's happiness. But the spell only works on Jana herself...
Malìa
1946
5.8The rich banker Rosen of Livorno fear that the Bonapartist will take all his gold, so he is hiding it inside a cuckoo clock.
The Cuckoo Clock
1938
6.2Pasquale and Maria, husband and wife, live in a palace supposedly haunted by ghosts and pay no rent. When Pasquale finds some food in the cupboard he thinks the ghosts are at work.
Ghosts, Italian Style
1967
6.2Pasquale and Maria, husband and wife, live in a palace supposedly haunted by ghosts and pay no rent. When Pasquale finds some food in the cupboard he thinks the ghosts are at work.
Ghosts, Italian Style
1967
5.7In the kingdom of Kindaor, traitor Sedesmondo kills his brother, the King of Kindaor, and becomes the tyrant of kingdom. He abandons the prince Arminio to beasts in the woods, but lions don't kill him and breed him as one of them.
The Iron Crown
1941
6.0A young man falls in love with a girl from whom he hides the fact that he is already engaged to a mature upper-class lady. To win her over, he hires two actors to portray his parents.
In High Places
1945
7.4A young girl comes to prison and experiences the entire prison subculture. The inmates she befriends vary from big tough dangerous dames to smaller submissive ladies who are totally lost in prison life.
Hell in the City
1959
6.4Once a young woman gets a man to fall in love with her, he must prove himself financially stable and meet her dowry requirements.
Two Cents Worth of Hope
1952
6.4Once a young woman gets a man to fall in love with her, he must prove himself financially stable and meet her dowry requirements.
Two Cents Worth of Hope
1952
7.0Furio Bertuccia, a corruptible lawyer who defends lost causes, is hired by the glamorous model Gloria Bianchi to defend her from the alleged murder of her lover.
The Archangel
1969
7.0An adventuress serves as bait for a swindler, who robs the naive people she brings to him with poker. A childhood friend helps him.
The Woman of Monte Carlo
1938
6.1In Florence, at the time of Lorenzo de Medici, known also as Lorenzo the Magnificent, the aristocrat brothers Chiaramantesi rule with an iron fist the streets of the city. Ruthless and fierce, the two brothers have chosen as their special victim the innocent and harmless Giannetto. Even though determined to not react to the cruel pranks of the brothers, Giannetto is forced to take a stand when Ginevra, a beautiful girl that works in the Chiaramantesi household, is dragged into the game. To defend his honor and protect the girl, Giannetto works out a fiendish plot that will end in blood and madness.
The Jester's Supper
1942
4.4A pretty woman approaching middle age rents out rooms in a small Italian town. An aging sailor and a handsome younger man are amongst the lodgers.
Crazy Sea
1963
4.4A pretty woman approaching middle age rents out rooms in a small Italian town. An aging sailor and a handsome younger man are amongst the lodgers.
Crazy Sea
1963
5.4In Shakespeare's classic play, the Montagues and Capulets, two families of Renaissance Italy, have hated each other for years, but the son of one family and the daughter of the other fall desperately in love and secretly marry.
Romeo and Juliet
1954
6.0In a massive department store the driver romances the shopgirl. The problem is that the manager also has his eye on her, and some employees seem to be pilfering goods from the place.
Department Store
1939
7.1A lovely, incisive portrait of adolescents in the crowded San Giovanni quarter of Rome during the last years of WWII.
Under the Sun of Rome
1948
7.1A lovely, incisive portrait of adolescents in the crowded San Giovanni quarter of Rome during the last years of WWII.
Under the Sun of Rome
1948
8.5Inspired by a real-life event that took place in Calabria at the end of World War 2, the film is the story of a young farmer who led peasants to revolt, after being falsely accused of murder.
The Brigand
1961
8.5Inspired by a real-life event that took place in Calabria at the end of World War 2, the film is the story of a young farmer who led peasants to revolt, after being falsely accused of murder.
The Brigand
1961
5.9Omnibus film with individual segments directed by Renato Castellani, Luigi Comencini and Franco Rossi; all of them starring the radiant Catherine Spaak as "out of place" women longing for love, in a Sicillian village, a monastery, and a modern Italian urban setting, respectively.
Three Nights of Love
1964
5.9Omnibus film with individual segments directed by Renato Castellani, Luigi Comencini and Franco Rossi; all of them starring the radiant Catherine Spaak as "out of place" women longing for love, in a Sicillian village, a monastery, and a modern Italian urban setting, respectively.
Three Nights of Love
1964
7.8Count Anikoff, a Russian officer, challenges his best friend, Sergei, to a duel when he finds him courting the young woman he, too, is in love with. Sergei can't bring himself to kill his friend. He fires only after taking the bullet out of his pistol. Now, it is the Count's turn to fire...
A Pistol Shot
1942
7.8Count Anikoff, a Russian officer, challenges his best friend, Sergei, to a duel when he finds him courting the young woman he, too, is in love with. Sergei can't bring himself to kill his friend. He fires only after taking the bullet out of his pistol. Now, it is the Count's turn to fire...
A Pistol Shot
1942
10.0This 1982 biographical television miniseries, as seen on PBS's Great Performances, dramatizes the life of this classic Italian composer known for operas including La Traviata, Rigoletto, and Aida and his Requiem.
Verdi
1982
6.5An Italian industrialist who has made a fortune in America returns to Italy planning to make a film about a beautiful woman who smiled at him before he left his home country years before.
Two Millions For a Smile
1939
8.0Young Prince Nechljudov is summoned as a judge in a murder trial. A rich merchant was found dead in the room of the inn where he was staying and the prostitute Maslova was accused of the crime. Nechljudov recognizes in the woman the maid of the aunts he had seduced and abandoned years before and tries to convince the authorities of her of his innocence but to no avail. Convinced that he is responsible for her moral fall, he follows her to Siberia where she must serve her sentence.
Resurrection
1958
8.0The difficulties of a young married couple, since the husband has to prepare for his examinations during his wife's pregnancy.
I sogni nel cassetto
1957
8.0The difficulties of a young married couple, since the husband has to prepare for his examinations during his wife's pregnancy.
I sogni nel cassetto
1957
6.2An engineer, devastated by the death of his fiance during a mountain expedition in north Italy, hopes he might forget about her by marrying a young nurse who adores him. But one day he returns to the mountain retreat where he’d had such happy days with his fiance, leaving his young bride distraught.
Woman of the Mountains
1944
6.2An engineer, devastated by the death of his fiance during a mountain expedition in north Italy, hopes he might forget about her by marrying a young nurse who adores him. But one day he returns to the mountain retreat where he’d had such happy days with his fiance, leaving his young bride distraught.
Woman of the Mountains
1944
6.5Everything unfolds in Naples seventeenth century, when a mysterious masked swordsman who calls Salvador Rossa becomes champion of the needy and lonely struggle against the cruel tyrant that frightens the country.
An Adventure of Salvator Rosa
1939
6.5A vivid assortment consisted of three acts taken from the lives of modern 1960s Italians, always in orbit around the restless theme of sexual inhibition and the pursuit of pleasure in sex.
Controsesso
1964
7.2A nineteenth-century Italian noblewoman, imprisoned in a foreboding lakeside palazzo by her uncle, comes to believe she's possessed by a long ago mistress of the manor.
Malombra
1942
7.0During Fascism and after WWII, a school porter sacrifices himself so his son, who is slightly ashamed of a lowly background, can become a respected professor.The film also takes a few jabs at Italy's rapid governmental reshuffles.
Professor, My Son
1946
7.0During Fascism and after WWII, a school porter sacrifices himself so his son, who is slightly ashamed of a lowly background, can become a respected professor.The film also takes a few jabs at Italy's rapid governmental reshuffles.
Professor, My Son
1946
10.0A young American agent living in Rome meets with a beautiful Swedish translator.
A Brief Season
1969

