Amarcord (1973)

Italian master director Federico Fellini created his most autobiographical work with Amarcord (1973). Set in the coastal Italian village of Borgo San Giuliano during Mussolini's reign, the film focuses on an adolescent boy named Titta (Bruno Zanin), Fellini's surrogate in this tale of fantastical realism about the strange and close knit inhabitants of this village. The film opens with a yearly ceremony to welcome spring by burning the witch of winter in a glorious celebration that brings everyone in the town together for an evening of merriment and revelry. Although Italy has fallen to Mussolini's fascist rule, the town itself more or less rejects these ideals, except on those rare occasions when members of the government come to town to observe and ensure that the various rules are being followed to the letter. A series of stories set over the course of the year, the film doesn't have a strong plot, just a string of incidents and memories from Fellini's own childhood that show how absurd the world can be when viewed from the perspective of a child. Everything from his uncle escaping a local asylum to a sexual awakening and first cigarette shared with the buxom local tobacconist is on the agenda in this Oscar winning Best Foreign Language Film, the fourth and final competitive Academy Award won by Fellini. Fans of Italian zaddies with plenty of meat on their bones are sure to get aroused by the sight of Titta's father, played by Armando Brancia, getting out of the tub and flashing his soaking wet ass for the camera!