Il Giardino Dei Finzi Contini (aka Garden Of the Finzi Continis) (1970)

Italy in the late 1930s as Mussolini's Fascist "race laws" are going into effect, an aristocratic Jewish family lives in near seclusion on their walled estate which protects them from the ugliness outside. But for how long? Based on the novel by Giorgio Bassini, this is the greatest of Vittorio De Sica's late period as a director. It's a haunting bittersweet memory piece and De Sica has recreated the period in loving detail, it even looks like it was made in the 1930s. The almost dreamlike quality serves for awhile to assuage what we know is inevitable and when it comes, it's almost unbearable. I'll never ever forget the confused and frightened look on Inna Alexeievna's face in the film's final moments. The exquisite Dominique Sanda and the effete Helmut Berger are inspired casting as the Finzi Contini brother and sister, both cut from the same cloth. A film to be cherished. The delicate underscore is by Manuel De Sica. With Lino Capolicchio, Fabio Testi and Romolo Valli.