The Secret of Santa Vittoria

The Secret of Santa Vittoria is a 1969 American war film distributed by United Artists. It was produced and directed by Stanley Kramer and co-produced by George Glass from a screenplay by Ben Maddow and William Rose. It was based on the best-selling 1966 novel by Robert Crichton. The music score was by Ernest Gold and the cinematography by Giuseppe Rotunno. The film stars Anthony Quinn, Anna Magnani, Virna Lisi, Hardy Krüger, and Sergio Franchi. It also features Renato Rascel, Giancarlo Giannini, and Eduardo Ciannelli; with Valentina Cortese making an uncredited appearance. It was shot almost entirely on location in Anticoli Corrado, Italy (near Rome). Plot The story is set during World War II in the summer of 1943, immediately after the fall of Italy's Fascist government under Benito Mussolini, when the German army moved to occupy most of the country. The only substantial source of income for the little hill town of Santa Vittoria is its wine. The townsfolk learn that the German occupation forces will be arriving soon, with plans to confiscate most of Santa Vittoria's wine and transport it to Germany. The people organize under the inspiration of their new mayor, Italo Bombolini (Anthony Quinn), who until days before had been thought of as a buffoon by everyone in town including his wife (Anna Magnani), and had only been appointed mayor by the town’s pro-Mussolini politicians as a ruse to deflect the people’s anger. With everyone working together, the villagers are able to hide a million bottles of wine by sealing them up in the galleries of an ancient Roman cave before the arrival of a German army detachment under the command of Sepp von Prum (Hardy Krüger). The Germans, when they arrive, confiscate most of the almost 320,000 bottles of wine the villagers had left for them to find. However, the Germans have accounting records that there is supposed to be five times as many bottles. Von Prum comes to suspect the rest is hidden in or near Santa Vittoria. He and Bombolini, two very different men, engage in a battle of wits in the days that follow. The Germans’ search is made complicated when von Prum becomes infatuated with Caterina Malatesta (Virna Lisi), an educated and elegant woman unlike any other in town. She is secretly sheltering and has fallen in love with Tufa (Sergio Franchi), a wounded captain in the Royal Italian Army, who, as it happens, has provided much of the brainpower for the town’s so far successful wine-hiding plans.