Italian film industry mourns producer Laurentiis
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The Italian film industry on Thursday mourned the death of Oscar-winning film producer Dino De Laurentiis, one of the best known film producers of all time, who died Thursday at his home in Beverly Hills at the age of 91.
De Laurentiis, who was born near Naples, Italy in 1919, had a career spanning nearly 70 years, worked with famed Italian directors Federico Fellini and Roberto Rossellini before moving to California in the 1960s, where he produced epic English language films including "War and Peace," "Dune," and "Serpico," where he is credited with helping to reveal the acting talents of an as-yet little known Al Pacino.
All told, De Laurentiis produced some 500 films and was nominated for 35 Oscars.
Despite an ongoing political crisis that could lead to the collapse of the government in Italy, many local television news programs led with the news of De Laurentiis' death on Thursday, while online news outlets hurried to report the developments. Several print outlets promised special tributes to the producer in their weekend editions.
Aurelio De Laurentiis, Dino's nephew and himself a film producer, called his uncle "a giant" who "was a witness to the rebirth of Italy after the Second World War and [who] told that story through film, making him of the architects of the Golden era of Italian film."
Tributes from other sources rolled in all day. Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who controls the Mediaset broadcast giant and the Medusa film production house, was away from Italy at the Group of 20 summit in South Korea and so could did not comment.
But homages came from other sources across the political spectrum, ranging from parliamentary speaker Gianfranco Fini to opposition leader Walter Veltroni, who, while mayor of Rome, founded the Rome Film Festival.
Condolences from actors and directors who had worked with De Laurentiis arrived from all corners. Among them, Sofia Loren, who knew De Laurentiis from the start of her career in the 1950s, and whose late husband, film director Carlo Ponti, worked with De Laurentiis on more than a dozen occasions.
"I feel an intense pain at the loss of Dino De Laurentiis," Loren told Italian television.
Italian film festivals -- ranging from Venice to Turin to Rome - - also offered their tributes to the iconic producer, while Rome's Cinecitta Studios, where De Laurentiis made many of his best known films, flew its flags at half mast.
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