Luchino Visconti Biography
Luchino Visconti was born on 2 November 1906 in Milan and was the fourth son of Duke Giuseppe Visconti di Modrone and Carla Erba, owner of the largest Italian pharmaceutical company.
At just 26 years old he became the owner of a horse stable, achieving excellent success. In 1936 he made his film career debut in Paris as assistant director and costume designer for Jean Renoir, coming into contact with intellectuals such as Jean Cocteau and some anti-fascist militants who had escaped from Italy. Visconti contributed to the creation of “Les basfonds” and “Une partie de campaigns”.
After a period in Hollywood, Visconti returned to Italy in 1939, following the death of his mother. In Rome, he meets a group of young intellectuals who collaborate with the magazine Cinema, from which the idea of realistic cinema focused on everyday life was born. In 1942, the director began working on his first film, "Obsession", inspired by James Cain's novel, "The Postman Always Rings Twice". The Second World War interrupted his career, but at the end of the conflict, Visconti made the documentary "Giorni di Gloria", a collective directed film dedicated to the Resistance and dealt with the scenes of the lynching of Donato Carretta, the former prison director of Regina Coeli.
Visconti directs famous films such as "Bellissima", "We are women", "Senso", "White nights", "Rocco ei his brothers" and "Boccaccio 70". In 1962, he directed "Il Gattopardo", based on the novel of the same name by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, which won the Palme d'Or and achieved enormous success with the public and critics. Visconti died in 1976.
