Cinema Paradiso - a movie by the famous Italian director Giuseppe Tornatore, tells the story of Salvatore (nicknamed Toto), a young boy who grew up fatherless in a small Sicilian village in the forties and fifties. Now a successful film director, he returns home for the funeral of Alfredo, his old friend who was a projectionist at the local cinema throughout Salvatore's childhood. Soon memories of his first love affair with the beautiful Elena, and all the highs and lows that shaped his life, come flooding back as Salvatore reconnects with the community he left 30 years earlier.
An extraordinary film like this would truly move its viewers. I'm one of them. I suggest you guys watch this too, it's a very old film though but it's one of the best Italian movies I have ever seen. Giuseppe Tornatore is one amazing director! I salute him for that. =)
THE STORY ABOUT THE SOLDIER AND THE PRINCESS
Alfredo: Once upon a time, a king gave a feast. And there came the most beautiful princesses of the realm. Now, a soldier, who was standing guard, saw the king's daughter go by. She was the most beautiful one, and he immediately fell in love with her. But what could a poor soldier do when it came to the daughter of the king? Well, finally, one day, he managed to meet her, and he told her that he could no longer live without her. The princess was so impressed by his strong feelings that she said to the soldier: "If you can wait 100 days and 100 nights under my balcony, then at the end of it, I shall be yours." Damn! The soldier immediately went there and waited one day. And two days. And ten. And then twenty. And every evening, the princess looked out of her window, but he never moved. During rain, during wind, during snow, he was always there. The bird shat on his head, and the bees stung him, but he didn't budge. After ninety nights, he had become all dried up, all white, and the tears streamed from his eyes. He couldn't hold them back. He no longer had the strength to sleep. All that time, the princess watched him. And on the 99th night, the soldier stood up, took his chair, and went away.
Salvatore: [later in the film, Toto gives Alfredo his interpretation] ... In one more night, the princess would have been his. But she also could not possibly have kept her promise. And it would have been terrible. He would have died. This way, however, at least for 99 days, he was living under the illusion that she was there, waiting for him.
