Luigi Comencini

Luigi Comencini ([luˈiːdʒi komenˈtʃiːni]; 8 June 1916 – 6 April 2007) was an Italian film director. Together with Dino Risi, Ettore Scola and Mario Monicelli, he was considered among the masters of the commedia all'italiana genre.

His daughters Cristina and Francesca are both film directors.

His first successful movie was L'imperatore di Capri, featuring Totò. Comencini's 1953 Pane, amore e fantasia, with Vittorio De Sica and Gina Lollobrigida, is considered a primary example of neorealismo rosa (pink neorealism). It was followed by Pane, amore e gelosia.

After first directing Alberto Sordi in La bella di Roma (1955), Comencini again worked with Sordi in what is considered his masterwork, Tutti a casa, a bitter comedy about Italy after the armistice of 1943. The film won the Special Golden Prize at the 2nd Moscow International Film Festival. Also set in World War II, but devoted to the Italian partisans, is La ragazza di Bube (1963). This was followed by Incompreso (1966, based on the English novel by Florence Montgomery).

Comencini obtained an outstanding success with what is ranked amongst the best productions of Italian television, The Adventures of Pinocchio (1972). In the same year, he directed the feature film Lo scopone scientifico, a dark comedy with Sordi and Silvana Mangano. In 1975, he released the mystery La donna della domenica, featuring Marcello Mastroianni, Jacqueline Bisset and Jean-Louis Trintignant.

Comencini's subsequent works were characterized by the presence of famous Italian actors of the time: Ugo Tognazzi in Il gatto (1977), or Nino Manfredi in his episode of Basta che non si sappia in giro. In the 1980s, Comencini's movies met with less success but his Cuore television series of 1984 was praised.

He died in Rome after a long illness in 2007.