Biography - Sophia Loren: Actress Italian Style [VHS]
Born a sickly infant in an Italian hospital charity ward to an unwed mother, Sophia Loren had a long, hard climb to her status as an international film star, Oscar winner, and United Nations Goodwill Ambassador. This 45-minuteBiography, part of the A&E; Great Entertainers series, engagingly chronicles her ascent and her tempestuous connection with her home country, which for years refused to acknowledge her marriage to her mentor, the divorced producer Carlo Ponti. Narrated by Peter Graves and rounded out with interviews from costars Tippi Hedron, Anthony Quinn, and Tab Hunter and biographer A.E. Hotchner, this video features clips of a young, heartbreakingly beautiful Loren in her early black-and-white Italian films all the way through to her 1995 performance inGrumpier Old Men. It also gives equal time to her personal life, including her refugee experience during World War II, her troubled relationship with her mother, and her well-publicized miscarriages, precarious pregnancies, and subsequent births to two sons with Ponti.--Kimberly Heinrichs