Five Beaches in a Starring Role

The Italian coastline extends for approximately 7,500km, a distance that is as long as the list of directors and actors who have used it to shoot their films. Some of these have become important reference points in the history of Italian cinema, others are memorable as backgrounds to events that we loved on the small screen. Let’s take a look at some.

Sardinia and Wertmüller

It is hard to choose just one of the many films that were shot on the marvellous coast of Sardinia. It is hard to order the beaches by beauty: however, very probably, the deserted island where Mariangela Melato and Giancarlo Giannini act on their burning passion in Lina Wertmüller’s Travolti da un insolito destino nell’azzurro mare di agosto (Swept Away) gives an idea. This of course was neither an island nor was it deserted, because the survivors of the shipwreck caused by her capriciousness actually wash up on a shore that is a composite of pearls on the eastern coast of Sardinia, Cala Fuili, Cala Luna and Capo Comino: three beaches clustered together in the Gulf of Orosei which created a single, wild and untouched island for the film.

Sicily and Montalbano

The coastline of another great Italian island, Sicily, has provided cinema and TV with many unforgettable views. In this case, the choice falls on the south-eastern coastline, studded with Baroque pearls and turquoise waters. Here, in the imaginary Vigata, in the equally imaginary province of Montelusa, the famous Inspector Montalbano has been investigating for twenty years. The house on the sea in Marinella, really Punta Secca in the municipality of Santa Croce Camerina, is as unforgettable as the Scala dei Turchi, a rocky wall that rises steeply from the sea on the Realmonte coast.

Like Crazy in Viareggio

Paolo Virzì’s La Pazza Gioia (Like Crazy) tells the story of two women patients in a therapeutic facility (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi and Micaela Ramazzotti), who, partly out by chance and partly by choice, live out an exhilarating adventure that will make them more mature, real and human in their weaknesses. The beach of Viareggio is the backdrop for the final poetic scene, with swim in the sea, where Donatella is able to make peace with her past before returning to Villa Biondi.

Poetry in Procida

Massimo Troisi’s last melancholic and touching role is indelibly linked to the island of Procida where the Pozzo Vecchio beach on the Western side of the island is now also known as the Postino beach in his honour. Here Mario, using what he has learnt from Pablo Neruda (Philippe Noiret) to whom he delivers post every day, wins the heart of Beatrice (a young Maria Grazia Cucinotta) by talking about poetry and citing metaphors. It is a horseshoe of sand, whose dark colouring, due to its volcanic origin, lends the sea an intense shade of blue.

Loose Cannons in Gallipoli

The Cantone family, owner of a large pasta company in Apulia, is anxiously awaiting the return of son Tommaso, destined to work alongside his brother Antonio in the family business. The film Mine vaganti (Loose Cannons) consecrated Ferzan Ozpetek’s love for the area of Salento, its Baroque main city - Lecce, its masserie (farmhouses) and, naturally, its coastline. Returning from Rome to Lecce where his interfering family lives, Tommaso has some revelations to disclose but a series of unexpected events prevents him from doing so. These include the arrival of his friends who dance to Baccara’s Sorry, I'm a lady at Punta della Suina on the Gallipoli coast in a memorable scene.