Seven Beauties

Seven Beauties (Italian: Pasqualino Settebellezze, "Pasqualino Sevenbeauties") is a 1975 historical black comedy drama Italian film written and directed by Lina Wertmüller and starring Giancarlo Giannini, Fernando Rey, and Shirley Stoler.

Seven Beauties
Italian theatrical release poster
Directed by	Lina Wertmüller
Written by	Lina Wertmüller
Produced by	Arrigo Colombo Lina Wertmüller
Starring	Giancarlo Giannini Fernando Rey
Cinematography	Tonino Delli Colli
Edited by	Franco Fraticelli
Music by	Nando de Luca e Enzo Jannacci
Production company	Medusa Distribuzione
Distributed by	Medusa Distribuzione
Release dates	4 May 1975 (1975-05-04) (France) 20 December 1975 (1975-12-20) (Italy)
Running time	115 minutes
Country	Italy
Language	Italian
Box office	$1.4 million[1]

Written by Wertmüller, the film is about an Italian everyman who deserts the army during World War II, is captured by the Germans and sent to a prison camp, where he does anything he can to survive. Through flashbacks, we learn about his seven unattractive sisters, his accidental murder of one sister's lover, his imprisonment in an insane asylum—where he rapes a patient—and his volunteering to be a soldier to escape confinement.

For her work on the film, Wertmüller became the first woman nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director. The film received three other Academy Award nominations, including one for Best Foreign Language Film.^[2] It also received a Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Foreign Film.^[3]

The production design and costume design are by Wertmüller's husband, Enrico Job.

Plot

The picaresque story follows its protagonist, Pasqualino (Giannini), a dandy and small-time hood in Naples in Fascist and World War II-era Italy.

To defend his family's honor, Pasqualino kills a pimp who had turned his sister into a prostitute. To dispose of the victim's body, he dismembers it and places the parts in suitcases. Caught by the police, he confesses to the murder, but successfully pleads insanity and is sentenced to 12 years in a psychiatric ward. Desperate to get out, he volunteers for the Italian Army. With an Italian comrade, he eventually deserts the army, but they are captured and sent to a German concentration camp.

Pasqualino attempts to survive the camp by providing sexual favors to the female commandant (Stoler). His plan succeeds, but the commandant puts Pasqualino in charge of his barracks as a kapo. He is told he must select six men from his barracks to be killed to prevent all from being killed. Pasqualino ends up executing his former Army comrade, and is responsible for the death of another fellow prisoner, a Spanish anarchist.

At the war's end, upon his return to Naples, Pasqualino discovers that his seven sisters, his fiancée, and even his mother have all survived by becoming prostitutes. Unfazed, he insists on marrying his fiancée as soon as possible.

Cast

• Giancarlo Giannini as Pasqualino Frafuso, a.k.a. Settebellezze
• Fernando Rey as Pedro, the anarchist prisoner
• Shirley Stoler as the Prison Camp Commandant^{[N 1]}
• Elena Fiore as Concettina, a sister
• Piero Di Iorio as Francesco, Pasqualino's comrade
• Enzo Vitale as Don Raffaele
• Roberto Herlitzka as Socialist
• Lucio Amelio as Lawyer
• Ermelinda De Felice as Pasqualino's mother
• Bianca D'Origlia as Psychiatrist
• Francesca Marciano as Carolina
• Mario Conti as Totonno "18 Carati", Concettina's pimp

Production

Casting

Giannini starred in three other films Wertmüller made during this period: The Seduction of Mimi (1972), Love and Anarchy (1973), and Swept Away (1974).

Filming locations

Seven Beauties was filmed on location in Naples, Campania, Italy.^{[citation needed]}

Opening sequence

In the opening sequence of Seven Beauties, spoken over World War II archival footage showing the destruction of cities and men, Wertmüller defines the object of her critique—a "particular petty bourgeois social type".^[4]

Reception

Critical response

The film's subject is survival. At the time of its release, it was controversial for its graphic depiction of Nazi concentration camps. In his 1976 essay "Surviving", Bruno Bettelheim, while admiring the film's artistry, severely criticized its depiction of the experience of concentration camp survivors.^[5] Bettelheim's own views about concentration camps have likewise been critiqued.^[6]

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 67% based reviews from 21 critics, and an average rating of 8/10.^[7] In April 2019, a restored version of the film was selected to be shown in the Cannes Classics section at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival.^[8]

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Category	Nominee(s)	Result
1977	Academy Awards	Best Foreign Language Film		Nominated
		Best Director	Lina Wertmüller	Nominated[N 2]
		Best Actor	Giancarlo Giannini	Nominated
		Best Screenplay – Written Directly for the Screen	Lina Wertmüller	Nominated
	Boston Society of Film Critics Awards	Best Rediscoveries		Won
	Directors Guild of America Awards	Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures	Lina Wertmüller	Nominated
	Golden Globe Awards	Best Foreign Film		Nominated
	New York Film Critics Circle Awards	Best Film		Runner-up
		Best Director	Lina Wertmüller	Runner-up
		Best Screenplay		Runner-up

See also

• List of submissions to the 49th Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film
• List of Italian submissions for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film
• List of Italian films of 1975
• The Seven Beauties: A medieval Iranian romance poem about the foreign escapades of the pre-Islamic Persian ruler, Bayram Gur. Framed in pleasantries in seven pavilions modeled on seven climes controlled by the seven planets followed by various sufferings, grievances and injustices encountered in seven of his subjects.