Adua and Her Friends

Adua and Her Friends (1960) is an Italian comedy-drama you can watch online on iFILM, directed by Antonio Pietrangeli. When Italian law closes the country's brothels, four women pool what they have and head to the countryside to open a restaurant — somewhere nobody knows their history.

The trattoria catches on. Regulars show up, one of the women gets engaged, life starts to look possible. Then the past finds the address. Simone Signoret plays Adua with a clear-eyed practicality that makes her the most interesting person in any scene she's in. Marcello Mastroianni is the unreliable man she decides to trust anyway. Emmanuelle Riva is also in the cast, a year after Hiroshima mon amour. Stream Adua and Her Friends (1960) online on iFILM.