Ghosts, Italian Style

This 1982 biographical television miniseries, as seen on PBS's Great Performances, dramatizes the life of this classic Italian composer known for operas including La Traviata, Rigoletto, and Aida and his Requiem.

A miniseries in three parts about the theft of Da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" in 1911.

An Italian proprietor of a squalid Djibouti bar collaborated in selling arms to Ethiopians fighting his own country's invasion but after finding his long lost son on the Fascist front he decides to choose patriotism over selfish profit.

Miniseries dramatizing the life of the Italian Renaissance polymath Leonardo da Vinci.

Young Prince Nechljudov is summoned as a judge in a murder trial. A rich merchant was found dead in the room of the inn where he was staying and the prostitute Maslova was accused of the crime. Nechljudov recognizes in the woman the maid of the aunts he had seduced and abandoned years before and tries to convince the authorities of her of his innocence but to no avail. Convinced that he is responsible for her moral fall, he follows her to Siberia where she must serve her sentence.

The difficulties of a young married couple, since the husband has to prepare for his examinations during his wife's pregnancy.

During the bombing of Naples in World War II, a cynical businessman helps a naive prostitute, who spends the next two decades desperate to have him reciprocate her feelings.

A young girl comes to prison and experiences the entire prison subculture. The inmates she befriends vary from big tough dangerous dames to smaller submissive ladies who are totally lost in prison life.

Giuseppe Verdi was born in 1813 and lived until 1901, his life spanning nearly a century of political turmoil and considerable personal turmoil. This 1982 biographical television miniseries, as seen on PBS's Great Performances, dramatizes the life of this classic Italian composer known for operas including La Traviata, Rigoletto, and Aida and his Requiem.

A lovely, incisive portrait of adolescents in the crowded San Giovanni quarter of Rome during the last years of WWII.

In regional Sicily, Jana tries to repair her sister's marriage by going to a sorceress who makes up a love potion that will bring about the couple's happiness. But the spell only works on Jana herself...

Furio Bertuccia, a corruptible lawyer who defends lost causes, is hired by the glamorous model Gloria Bianchi to defend her from the alleged murder of her lover.

An adventuress serves as bait for a swindler, who robs the naive people she brings to him with poker. A childhood friend helps him.

Everything unfolds in Naples seventeenth century, when a mysterious masked swordsman who calls Salvador Rossa becomes champion of the needy and lonely struggle against the cruel tyrant that frightens the country.

A vivid assortment consisted of three acts taken from the lives of modern 1960s Italians, always in orbit around the restless theme of sexual inhibition and the pursuit of pleasure in sex.

Treasure Island in Outer Space is a 1987 science fiction Italian and German television miniseries directed by Antonio Margheriti. It is based on the novel Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, setting the story in space on the year 2300. The series was produced by RAI Radiotelevisione Italiana in co-production with West Germany and France, and directed by Anthony M. Dawson. It is the biggest sci-fi production of Italian television. The miniseries of 5 episodes of 100 min was originally aired in Italy from November 19, 1987 on RAI Due channel. It was also adapted as a 120 min film. The miniseries is also known as Space Island (UK and Norway, USA on VHS) and Der Schatz im All (Germany).