Robert De Niro presents restored version of Bertolucci classic '1900'

Robert De Niro presented a special

screening of the newly restored 50th anniversary version of

Bernardo Bertolucci's classic tale of the class struggle and the

rise and fall of fascism, '1900', in a packed and adoring Roman

piazza Monday night.

The Hollywood acting legend shared memories of sharing the set

on the sprawling cult epic historical drama with Gerard

Depardieu, Donald Sutherland, Stefani Sandrelli, Dominique

Sanda, Burt Lancaster, Alida Valli and Laura Berti and, at 82,

candidly admitted that some memories simply weren't there any

more.

There was stadium-like cheering, complete with a Mexican Wave in

Piazza San Cosimato in Trastevere, the culmination of the 12th

edition of Il Cinema in Piazza.

The Fondazione Piccolo America put on the event, a feisty group

of young film buffs headed by Valerio Carocci that have been

moving and shaking after occupying the nearby shuttered Cinema

America movie theater.

A presentation-dialogue was hosted by Antonio Monda, a New

York-based journalist and academic and former Rome Film Festival

chief, and Carocci.

How did you meet Bertolucci?, they asked.

"I've forgotten, but I remember being struck by the script. He

was very nice, but at first I thought he was crazy.

"When we were shooting 1900, there was a scene where I played a

very old version of myself.

"We shot it at the beginning of the film, which I found

disconcerting, because it should have been shot later.

"And in fact, we reshot it at the end, Depardieu and I.

"The thing is, I was used to shooting in sequence, but

Bertolucci didn't do that," said De Niro, who plays Alfredo

Berlinghieri, heir to a wealthy family of landowners, starring

alongside Depardieu, who plays the Communist farmhand Olmo

Dalcò.

Carocci prodded the actor with a political question about why

and how Bertolucci used Hollywood funds to make this manifesto

of freedom against fascism:

"Of course it's a film about fascism, but I don't know exactly

what happened, and I don't even know if he was a communist or a

socialist, but it was definitely for the people."

Among the many "I don't remembers", De Niro hasn't forgotten the

difficulties of Bertolucci's set, nor the quality of the local

restaurants.

"I had a lot of difficulty with the language.

"There were people who didn't speak Italian, like me, and those

who spoke French or only English.

"It was a real mess, but of that long production, I especially

remember the magnificent restaurants in Reggio Emilia." De Niro

was then asked about another great director, Sergio Leone, who

directed him in Once Upon A Time In America.

"(He was) a man with a great sense of humour, a nice person who

didn't flaunt any pretensions; in short, he was fantastic."

And also "fantastic" for De Niro are almost all the actors and

directors he mentions, from Joe Pesci to Al Pacino, from Meryl

Streep to Sutherland.

At the finale of the event, the great Bob does not fail to greet

the now completely delirious square, shouting "God Bless Italy."

The restoration of 1900 was carried out by 20th Century Fox,

Paramount Pictures, Istituto Luce-Cinecittà, and Cineteca di

Bologna, with the collaboration of Alberto Grimaldi and the

support of Massimo Sordella at the L'Immagine Ritrovata

laboratory, under the supervision of Bernardo Bertolucci and

cinematographer Vittorio Storaro.

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