Monica Bellucci

Monica Anna Maria Bellucci (Città di Castello, September 30, 1964), known as Monica Bellucci, is an Italian model and actress. She started working as a fashion model for Dolce & Gabbana and Dior, before delving into acting as a film actress in Italy, the United States and France.^{[citation needed]}

Biography

Monica Bellucci was born in the Italian town of Città di Castello (Umbria), the only daughter of Pasquale Bellucci, owner of a trucking company, and Brunella Briganti, a painter. She began working as a model at the age of 16, when he was in high school. Her first professional steps were directed towards practicing law, although she decided to work as a model to pay for her studies at the University of Perugia, her fashion lifestyle led her to abandon her law degree.

She married fashion photographer Claudio Carlos Basso in 1990, but they divorced the following year.

Later, her next husband was the French actor Vincent Cassel, with whom she coincided in numerous films and whose separation was made public on August 26, 2013. They have two daughters together: Deva (born September 12, 2004) and Léonie (born May 21, 2010).

After their divorce, numerous tabloid magazines linked her to Telman Ismailov, a 56-year-old Russian billionaire of Azerbaijani origins.

She is fluent in three languages: Italian (her mother tongue), French and English; and some Spanish. She has played roles speaking all those languages, as well as Aramaic for her role as Mary Magdalene in The Passion of the Christ and Serbian in Emir Kusturica's film On the Milky Road (2016).

In 2004, while pregnant with Deva, Bellucci posed nude for the Italian edition of Vanity Fair magazine in protest against Italian laws banning sperm donation. pregnant and half-naked for the magazine in April 2010, during her second pregnancy.

In the documentary The Big Question, about the film The Passion of the Christ, she commented: "I am an agnostic, although I respect and am interested in all religions. If there is something that I believe in, it is in the mysterious energy; the one that fills the oceans during the waves, the one that unites nature with beings".

Since 2017, she was romantically linked to the French sculptor Nicolas Lefebvre, 18 years younger than Belluci. Although at the beginning of July 2018 they decided to end their life together.

Professional career

Model

In 1988, he moved to one of the nerve centers of European fashion, Milan, signing for the prestigious firm Elite Model Management. In 1989 she was already a recognized model in Paris and even on the other side of the Atlantic, in New York. She posed for Dolce & Gabbana and for the French brand Elle, among others. That same year, Monica Bellucci is attracted to the cinema, she takes acting classes, to become an actress.

In February 2001, she appeared on the cover of Esquire magazine and in 2003 on Maxim. most beautiful in the world of AskMen. Bellucci's modeling career is managed by Elite+ in New York. She is considered an Italian sex symbol She is currently the face of the Dior Cosmetics line.

Actress

Monica Bellucci at the Festival de Cannes in 2002.

Monica Bellucci at San Sebastian International Film Festival 2017.

His film career began in the early 1990s. He played brief roles in La Riffa (1991) and Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992). In 1996 she was nominated for the César Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Lisa in L'appartement and consolidated her position as an actress. In 1998 she participated in the film To those who aman, by the Spanish director Isabel Coixet.

His popularity rose worldwide after his roles in several successful European films, such as Malèna (2000) by Giuseppe Tornatore, The Pact of the Wolves (2001) and Irreversible (2002).

Since then he has worked in several European and North American films such as: Under Suspicion (2000), with Gene Hackman and Morgan Freeman; Asterix and Obelix: Mission Cleopatra (2002), with Gérard Depardieu; Tears of the Sun (2003), with Bruce Willis; The Matrix Reloaded (2003), by the Wachowski sisters; The Passion of the Christ (2004), directed by Mel Gibson; The Brothers Grimm (2005), by Terry Gilliam; Le Deuxieme souffle (2007); Shoot 'Em Up (2007), with Clive Owen; Ne te retourne pas (2009); and The Sorcerer's Apprentice (2010).

He has mainly participated in various film noir films, such as the controversial Irreversible, where an explicit and violent rape is exposed, and En el punto de mira. He has also ventured into science fiction films such as Matrix Revolutions and action films such as Tears of the Sun , alongside Bruce Willis.

Bellucci was to play Indian politician Sonia Gandhi in the biopic Sonia, originally planned for a 2007 release, but the project was cancelled.

Monica Bellucci in 2008.

The actress dubbed her own voice for the French and Italian versions of the film Shoot 'Em Up (2007). She also provided the voice of Kaileena in the video game Prince of Persia: Warrior Within and provided the French voice of Cappy in the dubbing of the animated feature Robots (2005).

In 2015, he starred in Spectre, the 24th film in the James Bond saga, alongside Daniel Craig. With her role, she became the oldest Bond girl (50 years old), a participation that was not without criticism due to controversies about the age of a Bond girl.

In 2022, he shared credits with Liam Neeson in the thriller “The Memory Of A Murderer”.

Her projects in 2023 are the TV series “Radical Eye: The Life And Times Of Tina Modotti” and the cinema is shooting the films “Siccità” and “Mafia Mamma”.

Filmography

Cinema

Television

Video Games

Video Clips

Awards and nominations