I mourn the death of Claudia Cardinale. I’ve seen a lot of her lesser-known work this year (LA RAGAZZA DI BUBE/ THE GIRL WITH THE SUITCASE, IL GIORNO DELLA CIVETTA/ THE DAY OF THE OWL, IL PREFETTO DI FERRO/ I AM THE LAW) and only learned to love her more. She was one of those rare performers whose smile lit up a screen and sparked some kind of opening or expansion in the hearts of spectators (Goldie Hawn, Audrey Hepburn, and Julia Roberts are others). Like Carmen Sevilla, who was dubbed ‘The Girlfriend of Spain’ Cardinale was publicised as ‘The girlfriend of Italy’, which I found interesting because they’re both very beautiful, and very sexy but in a non-threatening way (think of Ava Garden or Linda Fiorentino as opposites.); they both radiate positivity instead of danger. Like with Sophia Loren and Gina Lollobrigida, the other Italian superstars of her era, she could move from playing rural peasants to aristocrats with ease. She was a great actress, with a calm demeanour and a liveliness behind the eyes that audiences worldwide found easy to identify with. I learned from the Spanish obituaries that LES PÉTROLEUSES/ THE LEGEND OF FRENCHIE KING (Christian Jacques, 1972), a gunslinging Western in which she starred with Brigitte Bardot, a contemporary whose evocation of freedom had been an inspiration, played for years in Spain, an enormous hit, and was advertised as ‘BB contra CC’. A great star and a great actress whose filmography is a legacy that extends beyond the obvious works from Fellini, Visconti, Monicelli, Leone, Herzog, etc: it’s interesting to see the different works obits from diff countries highlight, depending on what traces they left on those particular cultures.

José Arroyo