03/03/2014 - Paolo Sorrentino is awarded the Oscar for best foreign language film. The director thanked Fellini, the Talking Heads, Scorsese, Diego Armando Maradona, Rome and Naples

Al film di Paolo Sorrentino la statuetta come miglior film in lingua straniera. Il regista ha ringraziato Fellini, i Talking Heads, Scorsese, Diego Armando Maradona, Roma e Napoli

It was a magical night for Italy in Los Angeles. The Great Beauty [+see also:
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trailer
interview: Paolo Sorrentino
film profile] by Paolo Sorrentino won the Oscar for best foreign language film after winning the European Film Award, a Golden Globe and a BAFTA. The Oscar was the first one for Italy since it won in the same category in 1999 for Life Is Beautiful by Roberto Benigni. It is Italy’s 11^th Academy Award since 1956, the year foreign languages became a category.  

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Toni Servillo, the film’s main actor, and producer Nicola Giuliano joined the director on stage. “Thanks to the sources of my inspiration,” Sorrentino said holding the statue up, “and therefore thanks to Fellini, to the Talking Heads, to Scorsese and Diego Armando Maradona; thank you to Rome and Naples, to my own personal great beauties Daniela, Carlo and Anna, to my parents.”

Italy’s new prime ministerl Matteo Renzi complimented the director on Twitter, writing “in these hours we should be thinking of something else, and we are doing so. But this moment of Italian pride for Sorrentino and The Great Beauty is everything.”

(Translated from Italian)