The King of LaughterMovies like The King of Laughter
- Key Features:
- Historical drama, Biopic, Courtroom drama, Freedom of speech, Theater, Family drama, Early 20th century, Italy, Lawsuit, Parody
- Tone:
- dramatic, earnest, restrained
- Target Audience:
- History buffs, Drama enthusiasts, Fans of biopics, Italian cinema aficionados
- Emotional Arc:
- Amusement → Anxiety → Defiance
The King of Laughter

In early 20th-century Naples, a theatrical parody lands beloved thespian and playwright Eduardo Scarpetta in court, facing a malicious lawsuit that could compromise his freedom of expression and the economic security of his extended family—including his son's, young Eduardo De Filippo.
The King of Laughter
During a winter storm, Ursus offers shelter to two orphans, Gwynplaine and Déa; some years later, they are still living together. Gwynplaine has become a famous star, but his success threatens his relationships with Déa and Ursus.

Two clowns living in Korea's Chosun Dynasty get arrested for staging a play that satirizes the king. They are dragged to the palace and threatened with execution but are given a chance to save their lives if they can make the king laugh.

In 18th-century Rome, impish aristocrat Onofrio del Grillo amuses himself by playing pranks on all sorts of people — his reactionary family and fellow nobles, the poors, the French occupiers trying to modernize society, and even the Pope himself.

Don Sallust is the minister of the King of Spain. Being disingenuous, hypocritical, greedy and collecting the taxes for himself, he is hated by the people he oppresses. Accused by The Queen, a beautiful princess Bavarian, of having an illegitimate child to one of her maids of honor, he was stripped of his duties and ordered to retire to a monastery.

An aging, down-and-out public employee must face the primary school examination.

A farcical biopic about Pablo Picasso, from his early years, to his middle years, to the years right before his death, and some of the years before and in-between that.

On his deathbed, a powerful Mafia boss names his estranged son heir to his criminal empire: however, his men discover too late that the son at issue is an idiotic manchild.

An absurd law prevents John, an unrecognized child at birth, from knowing the identity of his biological parents before his 100th birthday. To succeed in attracting public opinion, his only hope is to obtain the complicity of Gustavo, the only unrecognized-at-birth centenarian alive. The only one who would have the right to avail himself of this legislation but seems to have no interest in doing so. The Most Beautiful Century of My Life tells of the meeting between a centenarian projected into the future and a young man anchored in the past and of their unexpected friendship.

The story of a leading political man, suddenly telling “all the truth” after a serious illness and therefore overwhelming lifes of anyone surrounding him…

Elections are approaching and things don't look too good for the opposition. Their leader can't stand the pressure and disappears. To avoid a scandal, the upper echelons of the party concoct a risky plan: to replace him with his identical twin, a philosopher with BPD, whose eclectic ideas and direct approach unexpectedly make the party surge in the polls.

In 1914, with Italy on the cusp of joining World War I, a group of foreign artists establishes a commune on the rural island of Capri, catching the attention of young Lucia, a local illiterate shepherdess who soon falls under their spell.

A recently-deposed "Estrovian" monarch seeks shelter in New York City, where he becomes an accidental television celebrity. Later, he's wrongly accused of being a Communist and gets caught up in subsequent HUAC hearings.

Totokamen is an entertainer and an illusionist who performs in various Egyptian nightclubs assisted by his manager, Tarantenkamen. Taking advantage of cheesy tricks, Totokamen pretends to be the son of the god Amun.

Three characters' misadventures in semi-deserted, summertime Rome: a dim-witted mama's boy falls for a tourist; a would-be womanizer struggles to find company for his sex tourism trip to Kraków; a hippie is drawn into his father's schemes to bring him back into polite society.

Yuri Pelagatti is a stage actor who is left jobless after a traumatic separation that resulted in his inability to remember his lines. Arturo Merlino is a shabby “investigator” who chases cats escaped from their homes. When Arturo and Yuri cross paths, Yuri is under the mistaken impression that Arturo is a consummate professional. He contracts Arturo to follow his ex-wife in order to find proof of her infidelity. But when he accidentally comes into the possession of a mysterious suitcase containing 1 million Euro, a series of hilarious troubles and daring adventures will result in an unpredictable finale…

A queue at the ATM machine, a displaced family after a seismic shock that has half-washed their home, a tour within an art gallery, moments of everyday life that become the cues for the emergence of comic, farce, paradoxical situations – trademarks of one of the most successful Italian comic groups.

During a trip to Sicily in 1920, Luigi Pirandello meets two gravediggers-turned-playwrights rehearsing a play with their amateur dramatics. Pirandello takes an interest in the odd couple, having been suffering from writer's block while working on his eventual masterpiece, Six Characters in Search of an Author.

Traveling from New York to Italia, pretty Mary rushes into moody macho lawyer Tito. The girl immediately falls for the guy with the gruffy manners and in an very impertinent way, she leans on him as she gets in trouble: Not only that she gets tied up in her suite by some Gangsters, but also, her new husband is found dead.

The wealthy businessman Vincenzo realizes that he is a father too absent, but also that his two sons and 1aughter are spoiled and unable to support themselves economically. So Vincenzo stages their fraudulent bankruptcy and runs with their children in Taranto, in his old house. The boys are struggling to settle, but Vincenzo is confident about them and hope that they will soon find a job in the city. Meanwhile, an impostor blackmailer, who wants to marry the daughter of Vincenzo, arrives in Puglia, to expose the scam.

A beautiful girl Rosina lives In Rome. Her husband is strong as a bull and jealous as Shakespeare's Othello. Once the husband of Rosina kills a wealthy aristocrat, who sang the serenade to his wife, and now he is hiding from justice.

The king of a secret modern-time Medieval kingdom leaves his throne in inheritance to his son, who struggles to lead the kingdom in fight for its independence from the Italian state.

A tribute to Naples, this film presents six episodes: a clown exploited by a gangster, a pizza seller losing her husband’s ring, a child's funeral, a gambler beaten by a kid, a prostitute's unusual wedding, and a "wisdom seller" offering advice.

Eugene, a young nobleman, asks two penniless idlers to impersonate his noble relatives to help him marry Gemma, the daughter of an enriched cook.

Two silent movie actors escape from their film. Forced to find a way to survive in the real world, they will only cause troubles to the people they will meet along the way.

Two proud and estranged brothers, a disputed inheritance and a past that comes back. When he hears about the passing of his father - whom he has not seen in many years - Salvo returns to his native Sicily. He intends to convince his brother Lillo to sell the family farm and save his pizzeria, which is about to go bankrupt - a secret that he has kept even from his wife and children. But things will not be easy and Salvo will have to come to terms with his choices. A bittersweet comedy about family relations and how one never stops growing up, not even at fifty.

Mirea is about to be 18 years old, and her family is prepearing a big party for her. Teresa, Mirea's mother, wants to gain notoriety, so begins to spend recklessy for the celebration. When the day finally comes, an unexpected death puts it at risk.

Antonio goes to Rome to represent his fellow peasants, to request a highway that will be built in their region. But the guy is mastered by 'la dolce vita' and wastes the money entrusted to him for his mission. When Peppino is sent to to find out what happened, he lets himself be trapped by the gentle grip of 'la dolce vita'

In the first Italian film to be shot in color, Totò portrays a musician named Antonio Scannagatti who strongly hopes to sell his composition, "Epopea italiana", to Tiscordi, who is one of the most important Italian impresarios.

A boy and a girl fall in love but their fathers take a strong dislike to each other, clashing repeatedly during the preparations for the upcoming marriage.

A blocked screenwriter, Ezio, is trying to finish a story about two off-kilter families thrown together when their teenage children announce they’re getting married. So Ezio writes himself into the story with a romantic part—a development his characters welcome, as they’ve got some ideas of their own for bigger and better roles.

Magali plays in a brass band. Guillaume drives a small tourist train. Both spin a perfect love, they share modest dreams and their baby is about to come. But an unexpected news upsets their routine: a man appears and announces that he is Guillaume's estranged father and also reveals that Guillaume is his legitimate heir of a kingdom offshore of France and England. Guillaume and Magali start to dream of a life as monarchs, surrounded by faithful subjects in their castle, enjoying their wealth. But reality is often different to what you can imagine.

In 19th-century Papal Rome, Bartolomeo is a wealthy and greedy parvenu who craves a noble title. While trying to raise the money he needs to strike a deal with a prince for the hand of his daughter, he'll find himself caught in a magical journey between past, present and future. Assisted by some rather illustrious companions, he'll have to come to terms with whom he really is and give his life a new meaning.

Marco is married to a gorgeous woman, has a child and a great job. Everything seems perfect, at least until his wife of 25 years announces that she has another man and wants a separation. Marco is forced to leave home.

Cetto la Qualunque, having set aside all political ambition, is now nothing more than an entrepreneur. But the news of the worsening condition of his aunt leads him to return to Italy, where something from his past will be revealed and, “doubtlessly,” all of our lives will be forever changed.

To save his crumbling and rapidly-depopulating rural town, its mayor fakes a gruesome murder to attract media attention. His plan initially succeeds, but soon the situation will spiral out of control.

An old prince lives in his ancient palace in Rome together with the ghosts of his ancestors. For years he has proudly rejected huge offers by a real estate group seeking to buy the palace and build a department store in its place, but when he suddenly dies his nephew signs the deal. The palace seems lost, but the ghosts forge a plan to save it from destruction.

From childhood to fatherhood, Piero learns things the hard way while growing up in a working-class neighborhood of Livorno.

Ottavio Camaldoli is a professor of Latin and Greek. An honest and gentleman, he is considered a "fool" by everyone around him. But what would happen if this defenseless man, a victim of petty daily abuses in his social life, at work, and even at home, were to receive another man's heart transplant? Especially if this other man, the donor, were a brutal criminal with the sinister nickname of "O Barbiere" (The Barber)? Would Ottavio Camaldoli, after inheriting the heart, automatically become a criminal? Science tells us that these are just silly, ancient beliefs. But what if Donna Carmela, the Barber's ruthless mother, were convinced that her son is still alive thanks to the heart now beating in the professor's chest?

"The Family," an album with a velvet cover, is meant to touch the extended family of man. Formal portraits, bookends in this 80-year saga, enclose the central story, which opens with the baptism of Carlo, a baby in his grandfather's lap, and ends with Carlo as a grandfather with a baby in his arms. And never once do we get out of the house, whose rooms provide the film's structure. Comfort or passion? Carlo couldn't really decide until it was too late.

Serafino, a young and innocent shepherd, inherits a huge fortune. He immediately starts spending the entire sum on presents for his friends, causing the envy of his family.

In Palmi, a small town in Calabria, Don Vincenzo, a genial retired farmer, has a crazy idea to revive the local soccer team by organizing a bizarre fundraiser hiring the Italian major league Serie A, soccer player Etienne Morville, a bad-tempered guy but among the strongest in the world. Albeit unwillingly, Morville leaves Milan to move to Palmi and try to save his image. In the small town he will come up against a reality of sincerity, which will lead everyone on an unforgettable experience.

Set in Italy during the 1920s, a barber is in a wheelchair because of a psychosomatic illness after he lost the woman he loves.

An aged Charlie Chaplin narrates his life to his autobiography's editor, including his rise to wealth and comedic fame from poverty, his turbulent personal life and his run-ins with the FBI.

Film adaptation of the theatrical show Ammutta muddica performed by the trio composed of Aldo, Giovanni and Giacomo. The protagonist of the various sketches is the common everyday life, full of bizarre characters and comic situations.

Mark Antony has a brother-lookalike, Totonno, a sinister slave trader. Totonno secretly replaces Mark Antony in the most delicate moments.

A hapless carnival performer masquerades as the court jester as part of a plot against a usurper who has overthrown the rightful king of England.

A young restorer is commissioned to save a fresco representing the suffering of St. Sebastiano, which was painted on the wall of a local church by a mysterious, long-dead artist.

Felice Sciosciammocca, the mayor of Roccasecca, sends his nephew Ciccillo to Naples so that he will become a good doctor.

After refusing big and prestigious awards all over the world, Mr. Mantovani, Literature Nobel Prize winner, accepts an invitation to visit his hometown in Argentina, which has been the inspiration for all of his books. It turns out that accepting this invitation is the worst idea of his life. Expect the unexpected when you have used real people as characters in your novels!

Mike Hamilton, a Philadelphia lawyer, comes to Naples to settle the estate of his long estranged "black sheep" brother. Once there, he discovers that the deceased has left an 8 year old boy who is being raised by Michael's sister-in-law Lucia Curcio. To make matters worse, Lucia happens to be a sexy nightclub dancer.

Estranged, quarreling brothers Carezza and Sorriso have to put aside their differences to reclaim their father's beloved dune buggy from predatory real estate developer Torsillo, with the help of beautiful circus performer Miriam, whose family business is threatened by Torsillo's enforcers.

Antonio, a former variety actor, keeps his daughter in an excellent boarding school by organizing small scams with his friend and colleague Felice. Commissioner Malvasia good-naturedly persecuted him. When their respective unsuspecting children fall in love, the two fathers make peace.

Nearing death, videogame genius Leone Stella holds a contest to find an heir: several people named like him will compete in a live-streamed reenactment of his most famous exploits, and the winner will inherit his billion-dollar fortune.

A Milanese businessman is beside himself when his son tells him he's going to marry the daughter of a pizza maker from Naples.

Three Italians travel to their hometown to vote for elections: Pasquale is a Southern immigrant living in Munich who's genuinely happy to come back to Italy, even if just for a few days, but the country he dreams of is far from reality; Furio travels to Rome with his family, but his niggling attitude threatens to push his wife Magda over the edge; young Mimmo is also going to Rome, but the trip is repeatedly interrupted by worries about his grandma's health.

Italy, early '90s. Calm, clever and inscrutable, politician Giulio Andreotti has been synonymous with power for decades. He has survived everything: electoral battles, terrorist massacres, loss of friends, slanderous accusations; but now certain repentant mobsters implicate him in the crimes of Cosa Nostra.

The amorous adventures of Andrea Rossi-Colombotti, an army officer who finds pleasure with beautiful women in life-threatening situations.

A rich farmer is well known for being very unkind. He's misanthropic, misogynous and cantankerous. Until he meets by chance a gorgeous girl...

Roberto Benigni adapts the classic children's tale by Carlo Collodi for the big-budget family-oriented comedy Pinocchio.

Belle Duke, in order to get revenge on her former lover Philip Bang, organize his jail break. But instead of Philip is the Italian Felice Brianza, AKAS Felix, to escape. Now Felix is obliged to help Philip to escape. He will succeeded and from that moment on the two will join to defraud Belle. The swindle plot become more complicate when Felix falls in love for Philip's daughter.

Jep Gambardella has seduced his way through the lavish nightlife of Rome for decades, but after his 65th birthday and a shock from the past, Jep looks past the nightclubs and parties to find a timeless landscape of absurd, exquisite beauty.

Antonio and Giuseppe meet at the hospital, while awaiting the birth of their respective first children. The two leave together for a quick lunch, ending up involved against their will in an odyssey of amusing setbacks and bizarre characters.

After saving an infant of royal blood, knight Brancaleone forms a new army and sets out to return the baby to his father: a prince fighting in the Crusades.

Cristina is a rich, spoiled princess visiting Rome with her royal parents. The mission of their visit is to marry her off to a super-wealthy corporate type and thereby start to turn around the losses their small kingdom is experiencing in its casino business. These less-than-noble intentions get derailed when Barnaba, a zany bus driver enters their lives and falls madly in love with the gorgeous Cristina. He is nuts enough to succeed in this romantic chase after royalty, as love seems to fuel his determination to rid Cristina of her elitism and to make her see his own irrepressible attractions.

During the events of May 1968 in France, different worldviews of conflicting relatives collide in their family estate.

Historical evocation of Ludwig, king of Bavaria, from his crowning in 1864 until his death in 1886, as a romantic hero. Fan of Richard Wagner, betrayed by him, in love with his cousin Elisabeth of Austria, abandoned by her, tormented by his homosexuality, he will little by little slip towards madness.

"Loro", in two parts, is a period movie that chronicles, as a fiction story, events likely happened in Italy (or even made up) between 2006 and 2010. "Loro" wants to suggest in portraits and glimps, through a composite constellation of characters, a moment in history, now definitively ended, which can be described in a very summary picture of the events as amoral, decadent but extraordinarily alive. Additionally, "Loro" wishes to tell the story of some Italians, fresh and ancient people at the same time: souls from a modern imaginary Purgatory who, moved by heterogeneous intents like ambition, admiration, affection, curiosity, personal interests, establish to try and orbit around the walking Paradise that is the man named Silvio Berlusconi.

While Arturo tries to gain the love of Flora, he witnesses the history of Sicily from 1969 to 1992, miraculously dodging the crimes of the Mafia and supporting as a journalist the heroic struggle of the judges and policemen who fought this infamous organization.

Bewildered, Don Camillo learns that Peppone intends to stand for parliament. Determined to thwart his ambitions, the good priest, ignoring the recommendations of the Lord, decides to campaign against him.

1980s. Brazilian television exploding in color and auditorium programs not so politically correct. In the middle of this fervor, Augusto Mendes, a young rising actor, seeks his place in the sun. From porn studios to soap operas, he finally finds success and fame when he becomes "Bingo", a TV host clown from one of the audience leader TV shows for children. It turns out that behind the rice powder and red nose, nobody knows who he is.

Assola is an imaginary village on the border between Italy and France and the borderline crosses the village itself. The French customs agent Ferdinand is always trying to catch the Italian smuggler Giuseppe. Giuseppe discovers that Ferdinand was actually born in Italy and therefore he can't be a French customs agent.

A wily slave must unite a virgin courtesan and his young smitten master to earn his freedom.

Aspiring comic Rupert Pupkin attempts to achieve success in show business by stalking his idol, a late night talk-show host who craves his own privacy.

When Gelsomina, a naïve young woman, is purchased from her impoverished mother by brutish circus strongman Zampanò to be his wife and partner, she loyally endures her husband's coldness and abuse as they travel the Italian countryside performing together. Soon Zampanò must deal with his jealousy and conflicted feelings about Gelsomina when she finds a kindred spirit in Il Matto, the carefree circus fool, and contemplates leaving Zampanò.

A touching story of an Italian book seller of Jewish ancestry who lives in his own little fairy tale. His creative and happy life would come to an abrupt halt when his entire family is deported to a concentration camp during World War II. While locked up he tries to convince his son that the whole thing is just a game.

A newly arrived governor finds his province under the control of the corrupt Colonel Huerta. To avoid assassination by Huerta, he pretends to be weak and indecisive so Huerta will believe he poses no threat. But secretly he masquerades as Zorro, and joins the monk Francisco and the beautiful aristocrat Hortensia in their fight for justice against Huerta and his soldiers.

In many small episodes, various characters represent the typical vices and comedy of Italian society in early 2000.

It depicts the lives of several groups of characters interacting at the beach of Forte dei Marmi during the mid-1980s.

Naples/Sorrento, mid 20s. A couple of small thieves conceive a scam whereby one of them dresses up as a eunuch Turk to care for the women of the family of a wealthy man. They end up messing everything up, with lots of gags and funny events in the meantime.

Corrupt and sleazy entrepreneur Cetto La Qualunque comes back to Italy and "jumps into politics" lest his law-abiding opponent, Giovanni De Santis, is elected as mayor.

Italy, mid '60s. Three guys from a poor neighbourhood try to get rich by printing fake money using the fact that one of them works as a typographer. The story unravels around their embarrassed efforts to spend the money, their little family issues and ends with a surprise.

Antonio Barracano is a respected figure among the Neapolitan underworld, keeping order and administering justice according to his own criteria, beyond the law. One day he's faced with a dilemma after a youth asks him permission to kill his father.

Good hearted but not very wordly-wise, Dante is happy driving the school bus for a group of mentally handicapped children, while feeling he is somehow missing out on life and love. So he is very excited when after nearly being knocked down by her car he meets Maria, who seems immediately enamoured of him. He is soon invited to her sumptuous Palermo villa, little suspecting that this is part of a plot. He bears an amazing likeness to Maria's stool-pigeon gangster husband and it would be convenient for them if the mobster, in the shape of Dante, was seen to be dead and buried.

In a country where women are in charge, a man goes to unusual lengths to make his dream of marrying the daughter of a military leader come true.

Don Anselmo, a retired old man, decides to buy a motorized disabled stroller since all his pensioner friends own one. His family strongly refuses him to purchase the vehicle, so don Anselmo decides to take extreme measures to achieve his goal…

When her social-climbing father is relocated from small-town North to his native Rome, 12-year-old Caterina enrolls to his old school, finding herself at sea with an environment where students sort themselves by social class and their parents' political affiliation.

Alberto, a newspaper man, tries a one-time shot of living the good life with the help of his penniless mentor.

A retired professor of American origin lives a solitary life in a luxurious palazzo in Rome. He is confronted by a vulgar Italian marchesa and her lover, her daughter and her daughter's boyfriend, and forced to rent to them an apartment on the upper floor of his palazzo. From this point on his quiet routine is turned into chaos by his tenants' machinations, and everybody's life takes an unexpected but inevitable turn.

The life and times of Armando Feroci, a fortyish year old, who's been everything, a divorced husband, a careless father, an unreliable brother. The story is told in flashback by his friends while Armando has been mysteriously kidnapped in an Arab country by an integralist group and condemned to death.

A wealthy broker, his loyal butler, and a poor street seller all see their social positions change in a twist of fate.

The hit musical based on the life of Evita Duarte, an Argentinian actress who eventually became the wife of Argentinian president Juan Perón, and the most beloved and hated woman in Argentina.

Omar, better known as Omar the Strawberry, is an old-fashioned bandit. Forced to flee to Algeria, he makes a living out of petty crime, accompanied by his famous sidekick Roger. After decades of ruling the French criminal underworld, they must come to terms with their new life together, which until now has been one of debauchery and violence.

Peppino Impastato is a quick-witted lad growing up in 1970s Sicily. Despite hailing from a family with Mafia ties and living just one hundred steps from the house of local boss Tano Badalamenti, Peppino decides to expose the Mafia by using a pirate radio station to broadcast his political pronouncements in the form of ironic humour.

Arturo, the successful owner of an art gallery, and Renzo, a talented but decadent painter, are old friends who cannot stop bickering. One day, Arturo comes up with a solution to all their problems, but the plan they concoct turns out to be crazier and riskier than they originally expected.

Francesco is a psychoanalyst grappling with three hopeless causes: a bookseller in love with a book thief, a lesbian hell-bent on becoming straight after a heartbreak, and an 18-year-old in a relationship with a much older married man. Unfortunately, these patients are also his three beloved daughters!

Comedy about Zdzisław Najmrodzki, most famous polish criminal in the times of Polish People Republic, named "the getaway king", known for stealing cars and escaping prison many times, but never hurting anybody.

Antonio, Peppino and Lucia are three brothers who live in the country near Naples. Lucia's son, Gianni, goes to Naples to study medicine, but there he knows a ballet dancer. They fall in love and, when she goes to Milan, Gianni follows her. Informed of this and afraid that their nephew will stop studying, the three Caponi brothers leave for Milan to persuade Gianni to come back and continue studying and abandon the "Malafemmina" (bad girl).


