Based on the plot of Euripides' Medea. Medea centers on the barbarian protagonist as she finds her position in the Greek world threatened, and the revenge she takes against her husband Jason who has betrayed her for another woman.

The Decameron

1971

Italian

7.0

♡ 26

Action

anthology

based on novel or book

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Vittorio Fanfoni as

Pier Paolo Pasolini as Allievo di Giotto

Giani Esposito as (as Giovanni Esposito)

Monique van Vooren as Queen of Skulls

A young Sicilian is swindled twice, but ends up rich; a man poses as a deaf-mute in a convent of curious nuns; a woman must hide her lover when her husband comes home early; a scoundrel fools a priest on his deathbed; three brothers take revenge on their sister's lover; a young girl sleeps on the roof to meet her boyfriend at night; a group of painters wait for inspiration; a crafty priest attempts to seduce his friend's wife; and two friends make a pact to find out what happens after death.

The Gospel According to St. Matthew

1964

Italian

7.6

♡ 7

89%

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Luigi Barbini as Giacomo

Rossana Di Rocco as L'Angelo del Signore

Ninetto Davoli as Pastore con bambino

Paola Tedesco as Salomè

Along a rocky, barren coastline, Jesus begins teaching, primarily using parables. He attracts disciples; he's stern, brusque, and demanding. His parables often take on the powers that be, so he and his teachings come to the attention of the Pharisees, the chief priests, and elders. They conspire to have him arrested, beaten, tried, and crucified, just as he prophesied to his followers.

Mamma Roma

1962

Italian

7.8

♡ 7

95%

90%

Drama

friendship

parent child relationship

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Franco Citti as Carmine

Anna Magnani as Mamma Roma

Lamberto Maggiorani as Un malato

Antonio Spoletini as Un pompieretto

After years spent working as a prostitute in her Italian village, middle-aged Mamma Roma has saved enough money to buy herself a fruit stand so that she can have a respectable middle-class life and reestablish contact with the 16-year-old son she abandoned when he was an infant. But her former pimp threatens to expose her sordid past, and her troubled son seems destined to fall into a life of crime and violence.

The Hawks and the Sparrows

1966

Italian

7.2

♡ 4

85%

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Giovanni Tarallo as Il contadino affamato

Ninetto Davoli as Ninetto Innocenti / Frate Ninetto

Domenico Modugno as The Balladeer Totò

Totò as Totò Innocenti / Frate Cicillo

A man and his son take an allegorical stroll through life with a talking bird that spouts social and political philosophy.

Arabian Nights

1974

Italian

6.6

♡ 30

83%

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Luigi Antonio Guerra as

Ninetto Davoli as Aziz

Elisabetta Genovese as Munis

Franco Citti as The Demon

The final part of Pasolini's Trilogy of Life series is rich with exotic tales of slaves and kings, potions, betrayals, demons and, most of all, love and lovemaking in all its myriad forms. Mysterious and liberating, this is an exquisitely dreamlike and adult interpretation of the original folk tales.

Love Meetings

1964

Italian

7.5

♡ 8

81%

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Graziella Chiarcossi as Graziella the Bride

Pier Paolo Pasolini as Himself / Interviewer

Oriana Fallaci as Self

Graziella Granata as Self - Girl at Lido with Long Hair

Pier Paolo Pasolini sets out to interview Italians about sex, apparently their least favorite thing to talk about in public: he asks children if they know where babies come from; asks old and young women if they support gender equality; asks both sexes if a woman's virginity still matters, what do they think of homosexuality, if divorce should be legal, or if they support the recent abolition of brothels. He interviews blue-collar workers, intellectuals, college students, rural farmers, the bourgeoisie, and every other kind of people, painting a vivid portrait of a rapidly-industrializing Italy, hanging between modernity and tradition — toward both of which Pasolini shows equal distrust.

Teorema

1968

Italian

7.0

♡ 27

83%

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Anne Wiazemsky as Odetta, the daughter

Massimo Girotti as Paolo, the father

Andrés José Cruz Soublette as Pietro, the son

Terence Stamp as The Visitor

A wealthy Italian household is turned upside down when a handsome stranger arrives, seduces every family member and then disappears. Each has an epiphany of sorts, but none can figure out who the seductive visitor was or why he came.

Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom

1975

Italian

5.8

♡ 98

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Dorit Henke as Doris - Female Victim

Caterina Boratto as Signora Castelli

Hélène Surgère as Signora Vaccari

Paolo Bonacelli as The Duke

Four corrupted fascist libertines round up 9 teenage boys and girls and subject them to 120 days of sadistic physical, mental and sexual torture.

Oedipus Rex

1967

Italian

7.2

♡ 15

89%

77%

Action

Drama

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Carmelo Bene as Creonte

Pier Paolo Pasolini as High Priest

Alida Valli as Merope

Julian Beck as Tiresia

In pre-war Italy, a young couple have a baby boy. The father, however, is jealous of his son - and the scene moves to antiquity, where the baby is taken into the desert to be killed. He is rescued, given the name Oedipus, and brought up by the King and Queen of Corinth as their son. One day an oracle informs Oedipus that he is destined to kill his father and marry his mother. Horrified, he flees Corinth and his supposed parents - only to get into a fight and kill an older man on the road…

Notes Towards an African Orestes

1970

Italian

6.6

♡ 6

Documentary

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Pier Paolo Pasolini as Self

Donald F. Moye as Self - Musican: drums

Gato Barbieri as Self - Musician: saxophone

Archie Savage as Self - Singer

The director presents takes and scenes filmed on location in Africa for a film-that-never-was, a black Oresteia.

Pigsty

1969

Italian

6.6

♡ 2

Pier Paolo Pasolini Director

Ugo Tognazzi as Herdhitze

Anne Wiazemsky as Ida

Jean-Pierre Léaud as Julian Klotz

Antonino Faà di Bruno as Vecchio (scena della sentenza)

Two dramatic stories. In an undetermined past, a young cannibal (who killed his own father) is condemned to be torn to pieces by some wild beasts. In the second story, Julian, the young son of a post-war German industrialist, is on the way to lie down with his farm's pigs, because he doesn't like human relationships.