Cinema Paradiso

Cinema Paradiso (Nuovo Cinema Paradiso, 1988) is an Italian-French drama you can watch online on iFILM. Director Giuseppe Tornatore set the story in a small Sicilian village — a place that felt like the whole world when you were a child and a wound when you came back as an adult.

Salvatore, a successful Rome filmmaker, learns that old Alfredo has died. Thirty-odd years collapse in an instant. As a boy, Totò (Salvatore Cascio) practically lived inside the projection booth of the local Cinema Paradiso, learning the craft and the life lessons from projectionist Alfredo (Philippe Noiret). Noiret plays the man as someone who gives advice the way people hand over money — reluctantly, and only when they think you really need it. Totò grows up, falls hard for Elena, then leaves the village because Alfredo tells him to. The reason why only becomes clear much later.

Tornatore drew the script from his own Sicilian boyhood; Ennio Morricone wrote the score, and the main theme became one of the most recognised pieces of film music ever recorded. The picture won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1990 and a Director's Cut running 173 minutes was released later. Stream Cinema Paradiso online on iFILM.