Matera
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Matera (Template:IPA-it, Template:IPA-itdia; Materano: Template:Lang Template:IPA-nap) is a city in the region of Basilicata, in Southern Italy. It is the capital of the province of Matera. The town lies in a small canyon carved out by the Gravina River.
Known as Template:Lang ("the underground city"), its historical centre "Sassi" contains ancient cave dwellings. The exact date when these were first occupied, and the continuity of subsequent occupation, are questions that scholars still debate. Sassi, along with the park of the Rupestrian Churches, was awarded World Heritage Site status by UNESCO in 1993.
Matera is one of the 2019 European Capitals of Culture, together with the Bulgarian town of Plovdiv.
Cinema
Because of the ancient primeval-looking scenery in and around the Sassi, it has been used by filmmakers as the setting for ancient Jerusalem. The following famous biblical period motion pictures were filmed in Matera:
- Pier Paolo Pasolini's The Gospel According to St. Matthew (1964)
- Bruce Beresford's King David (1985)
- Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ (2004)
- Abel Ferrara's Mary (2005)
- Catherine Hardwicke's The Nativity Story (2006)
- Cyrus Nowrasteh's The Young Messiah (2016)
- Timur Bekmambetov's Ben-Hur (2016)
- Garth Davis's Mary Magdalene (2018)
Other movies filmed in the city include:
- Mario Volpe's Le due sorelle (1950)
- Alberto Lattuada's La lupa (1953)
- Roberto Rossellini's Garibaldi (1961)
- Luigi Zampa's Roaring Years (1962)
- Brunello Rondi's Il demonio (1963)
- Nanni Loy's Made in Italy (1965)
- Francesco Rosi's More Than a Miracle (1967)
- Lucio Fulci's Don't Torture a Duckling (1972)
- Roberto Rossellini's Anno uno (1974)
- Paolo and Vittorio Taviani's Allonsanfàn (1974)
- Fernando Arrabal's The Tree of Guernica (1975)
- Carlo Di Palma's Qui comincia l'avventura (1975)
- Francesco Rosi's Christ Stopped at Eboli (1979)
- Francesco Rosi's Three Brothers (1981)
- Paolo and Vittorio Taviani's The Sun Also Shines at Night (1990)
- Giuseppe Tornatore's The Star Maker (1995)
- John Moore's The Omen (2006)
- Liu Jiang's Let's Get Married (2015)
- Matteo Rovere's Italian Race (2016)
- Patty Jenkins's Wonder Woman (2017)
- Cary Joji Fukunaga's Bond 25 (2020)
See also
