'Life' is Italian box office champ

By Jack January 4, 2000 10:46 AM

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Roberto Benigni's Life Is Beautiful has become the most successful Italian film ever -- its $45-million world gross beating the $43-million international take of Last Tango in Paris, directed by Bernardo Bertolucci.?(Unlike Life Is Beautiful, 1972's Tango had an internationally known star, Marlon Brando.) The third biggest Italian-made film of all time, reported French daily Liberation, was 1996's Il Ciclone (The Cyclone, whose success is remarkable given its limited release outside of Italy.?Perhaps equally remarkable is the fact that Federico Fellini's highly influential La Dolce Vita, produced in 1960, came in at No.?28.?It could not be determined how currency fluctuations might have been reckoned in the tally.

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