Monica Bellucci names her five most defining roles
Italian actor Monica Bellucci began her career as a model before rising to prominence following a role in Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula. She soon performed in a mixture of Italian, American and French movies, notably The Apartment to Malèna and Irréversible.
Bellucci also appeared in The Matrix franchise, beginning with 2003’s The Matrix Reloaded, proving her ability to feature in a wide range of genres. The actor has remained consistently active in the industry since the 1990s, and she’s next set to star in the long-awaited comedy Beetlejuice 2.
Reflecting on her successful career, Bellucci has discussed some of her most iconic, defining performances with A.Frame. She cites Bram Stoker’s Dracula as a turning point, even though the role was minor. “When I say yes to a character, it is because I wanted to share a moment of acting that is interesting for me, but sometimes that can be a big role. Sometimes, that can be a small role,” she said. “Sometimes it’s just a matter of meeting interesting people and being on set with creative directors, talented artists, enjoying the moment.”
Giuseppe Tornatore’s Malèna was another highly important role for Bellucci. She called the 2000 film an “incredible story”. Due to her love of the director’s film Cinema Paradiso, the actor was excited to join the project. The pair had worked together on a Dolce and Gabbana commercial, with Tornatore telling Bellucci he would contact her in the future to shoot a film.
She explained: “It was an important movie because it was an Italian movie travelling around the world. For Italy, Malèna was a big deal.”
Bellucci starred in the major blockbuster The Matrix Reloaded in 2003, which came after Bellucci saw the first movie in the series and thought to herself, “Oh my God, I want to make a movie like that.” Luckily, she was contacted by the Wachowski sisters and offered the role of Persephone, “That’s the way it is — cinema is coincidences and unpredictable situations.”
A year later, she appeared in The Passion of the Christ by Mel Gibson, which she called a “crazy movie”. Like Irréversible, the movie garnered significant controversy. “When I did this movie, I mean, nobody would believe that this film would become what it became!”
She added: “I guess I make controversial movies.”
Bellucci also highlighted a more recent movie, 2015’s Spectre, wherein she played Lucia Sciarra. She commented, “I was 50 years old, so when my agent called me, saying, ‘Listen, some people want to meet you for Spectre,’ I said, ‘Who am I going to play? M?!’ Actually, it was a revolutionary thing that a 50-year-old woman would be in a film like that.”
Five movies that define Monica Bellucci:
- Bram Stoker’s Dracula
- Malèna
- The Matrix Reloaded
- The Passion of the Christ
- Spectre
