Antonio Pietrangeli Biography
Antonio Pietrangeli (1919 - 1968) was an Italian director and screenwriter. He attended elementary school at the Ruggero Bonghi institute and classical high school in the private Santa Maria. He enrolled in medical school and, having graduated in 1945, practiced the profession for some time, before dedicating himself to cinema and journalism, which he had been interested in since he was a student. Father of the director and singer-songwriter Paolo Pietrangeli, he began his career as a film critic and taught at the Experimental Cinematography Center. At the beginning of the 1940s he collaborated uncredited on the screenplay of Ossessione (1943) by Luchino Visconti. After appearing in Roberto Rossellini's Europa '51 (1952), he made his debut behind the camera with Il sole nelle occhi (1953). A refined analyst of the female figure, he then directed Adua and her companions (1960) with Simone Signoret and Emmanuelle Riva, La parmigiana (1963) with Catherine Spaak and I knew her well (1965) with Stefania Sandrelli, Nastro d'argento for direction, screenplay and supporting actor to Ugo Tognazzi. His last film was Come, Quando, Paese (1969), during the filming of which he accidentally died by drowning. With his cinema he has outlined an admirable collection of female figures whose backdrop is an Italy in the midst of its most violent mutation, that of the economic boom.
