Novecento / Director: Bernardo Bertolucci / Italy, France, Germany 1976 / 317 min. / Format: DCP / Subtitles: English, Czech / 15+
Through the eyes of its main protagonists (excellent performances by De Niro and Depardieu), the film follows the political conflict between fascism and communism in the first half of the twentieth century.
A lavish historical drama set in northern Italy and featuring an international cast, Novecento follows the lives of two men – landowner Alfredo Berlinghieri (De Niro) and peasant Olmo Dalcò (Depardieu) – as they witness and participate in the political struggles between fascism and communism in the first half of the twentieth century. The film premiered out of competition at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival. With an original runtime of 317 minutes, 1900 is one of the longest commercially released films in history. Due to its length, in many countries (including Italy) it was shown in two parts. In other countries such as the United States cinemas only showed an edited 247-minute version. Today, the film is a cult classic that has been released in several special home video editions by a number of different distributors. A restored version premiered out of competition in Venice in 2017.
