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Movies like The Spider's Stratagem

Key Features:
Political intrigue, Mystery, Historical drama, Italy, Fascism, Family secrets, Unreliable narrator, Conspiracy, Betrayal
Tone:
serious, restrained, poetic
Target Audience:
Art house cinema enthusiasts, Fans of political thrillers, Those interested in Italian history, Mystery lovers
Emotional Arc:
Intrigue → Confusion → Disillusionment

The Spider's Stratagem

1970-09-17
The Spider's Stratagem Poster - Find Similar Movies

A young man returns to his countryside hometown to investigate the unclear circumstances behind the death of his father, ostensibly killed by Fascists in 1936, before his birth. As he unravels a web of lies that seems to encompass the whole town, he finds himself entangled in the same web.

Genres
Mystery, Drama
Cast
Giulio Brogi, Alida Valli, Pippo Campanini, Franco Giovanelli, Tino Scotti, Allen Midgette
Crew
Bernardo Bertolucci, Bernardo Bertolucci, Eduardo de Gregorio, Marilù Parolini
Rating
7(88 votes)
The Spider's StratagemThe Spider's Stratagem
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Familia
Familia(2024)
6.961

Luigi has lived with his mother and little brother since their abusive father Franco left when he was 10. Now a young man brimming with rage, he joins a far-right gang in search of belonging, but Franco's return poisons everything.



Giovanna's Father
6.9

Michele Casali is a middle-class professor in Fascist Italy who teaches at the same high school attended by his only daughter, Giovanna. A shy and sensitive girl, her insecurities are only magnified by Michele's overprotectiveness—reaching a point of no return.



The Conformist
7.6

A weak-willed Italian man becomes a fascist flunky who goes abroad to arrange the assassination of his old teacher, now a political dissident.



La Commare Secca
6.6

Roman police detectives interrogate a series of potential perpetrators in their struggle to determine whom to arrest for the brutal murder of a beautiful prostitute whose body is discovered in a park on the day of a torrential rainstorm. One by one, the prime suspects -- girl-crazy teenager Nino, pickpocket Canticchia, a soldier on leave, a tourist and a pimp -- recount the events of the day to the police, each insisting he is innocent.



Amarcord
Amarcord(1973)
7.9

In an Italian seaside town, young Titta gets into trouble with his friends and watches various local eccentrics as they engage in often absurd behavior. Frequently clashing with his stern father and defended by his doting mother, Titta witnesses the actions of a wide range of characters, from his extended family to Fascist loyalists to sensual women, with certain moments shifting into fantastical scenarios.



Il figlio più piccolo

Ruthless businessman Luciano reconnects with his estranged family from a previous marriage, only to use their youngest son, awkward and starry-eyed Baldo, as the fall guy for his failing endeavor.



Totò diabolicus
7.1

The marquis Galeazzo di Torre Alta is murdered by a mysterious killer who calls himself Diabolicus. His heirs are his three brothers and a sister, but all of them, with the exception of Monsignor Antonino di Torre Alta, are killed by Diabolicus. The police are unable to solve the case, but when Antonino gives his inheritance to Pasquale Bonocore, illegitimate son of his father and Pasquale is in prison and therefore can't be the killer, all the clues are in the hand of the police.



Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion

Rome, Italy. After committing a heinous crime, a senior police officer exposes evidence incriminating him because his moral commitment prevents him from circumventing the law and the social order it protects.



Who Killed Pasolini?

November 2, 1975: Pier Paolo Pasolini is murdered in the outskirts of Rome. The suspect, a 17-year-old hustler, pleads to have acted in self-defense, citing Pasolini's notorious sexual habits as proof. However, many inconsistencies start to undermine his version, pointing to him not having acted alone or even being assaulted in the first place. Was Pasolini also killed for another reason?



Spider in the Web
4.9

A young operative is sent on a mission to follow an older agent who's behavior has come into question.



1900
1900(1976)
7.8

The epic tale of a class struggle in twentieth century Italy, as seen through the eyes of two childhood friends on opposing sides.



Labyrinth of Lies
7.2

A young prosecutor in postwar West Germany investigates a massive conspiracy to cover up the Nazi pasts of prominent public figures.



Pedro Páramo
6.947

A man searches for his father, Pedro Páramo, in a town doomed by violence and the fury of a frustrated love.



Spider
Spider(2002)
6.646

A mentally disturbed man takes residence in a halfway house. His mind gradually slips back into the realm created by his illness, where he replays a key part of his childhood.



Story of a Love Affair

A wealthy, possessive husband's investigation reignites his young wife's past love, leading them to plot against him. As obstacles fall away, their passion faces a new test.



General Della Rovere

The Gestapo forces con man Victorio Bardone to impersonate a dead partisan general in order to extract information from his fellow inmates.



Security
Security(2021)
5.5

After the assault of a young woman in their seaside town, a security expert and his family get caught in a powerful riptide of secrets and lies.



The Witches
6

Five short stories loosely dealing with the roles of women in society. A superstar actress travels to a mountain resort, only to evoke jealousy from women and lust from men. A woman offers to take an injured man to the hospital. A widowed father and his son seek for a new wife/mother. A man seeks revenge for a woman's honor. A bored housewife tries to explain to her husband that he's not as romantic as he used to be.



Love and Anarchy
7.67

Set in Fascist Italy before the outbreak of World War II, the story centers on Tunin, a farmer turned anarchist who stays in a brothel while preparing to kill Benito Mussolini.



The Suspicious Death of a Minor

Police detective Paolo Germi and the mysterious Marisa meet each other at a dance hall. Germi is unsuspecting of the secret Marisa is carrying with her: adverse conditions forced her into prostitution. As Germi finds the young girl brutally murdered, he decides to go after her killers. During his investigation, he enters a world of intrigue and obfuscation that leave an endless trail of blood.



The Swindle
7.306

Aging small-time conman Augusto works with two younger men: Roberto, who desires to become the Italian Johnny Ray, and Carlo, nicknamed Picasso. Through a series of mishaps and personal entanglements, things go badly for Augusto.



Why
Why(1971)
7.244

Giuseppe Di Noi, an Italian surveyor living in Swiden, gets arrested at the border while going back to Italy with his family for a vacation. But can someone tell the man why?



Human Capital
7.5

The destinies of two families are irrevocably tied together after a cyclist is hit off the road by a jeep in the night before Christmas Eve.



I Vitelloni
7.6

Five young men dream of success as they drift lazily through life in a small Italian village. Fausto, the group's leader, is a womanizer; Riccardo craves fame; Alberto is a hopeless dreamer; Moraldo fantasizes about life in the city; and Leopoldo is an aspiring playwright. As Fausto chases a string of women, to the horror of his pregnant wife, the other four blunder their way from one uneventful experience to the next.



Luna
Luna(1979)
6.3

While touring in Italy, a recently-widowed American opera singer has an incestuous relationship with her 15-year-old son to help him overcome his heroin addiction.



The Terrace
7.16

Eight Italian politicians from the communist party gather on a terrace in Rome for a get-together. They discuss about their past, present and future.



A Castle in Italy
5.36

Louise meets Nathan, her dreams resurface. It's also the story of her ailing brother, their mother, and the destiny of a leading family of wealthy Italian industrialists. The story of a family falling apart, a world coming to an end and love beginning.



Me & You
Me & You(2012)
6.2

An introverted teenager tells his parents he is going on a ski trip, but instead spends his time alone in his mom's basement. But things didn't go as planned after his half sister joins him.



The Best of Youth
8.069

After a fateful encounter in the summer of 1966, the lifepaths of two brothers from a middle-class Roman family diverge, intersecting with some of the most significant events of postwar Italian history in the following decades.



The Body
The Body(2024)
6.533

Rich entrepreneur Rebecca Zuin has died from an alleged heart attack, raising suspicions on the part of a police inspector after her body disappears from the morgue. When her handsome young husband becomes a suspect, he starts thinking she may have faked her death to sadistically torment him.



Whatsoeverly
6.1

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.



Bellissima
7.756

Film director Blasetti is looking for a little girl for his new movie. Along with other mothers, Maddelena takes her daughter to Cinecittà, hoping she’ll be selected and become a star. She is ready to sacrifice anything for little Maria.



Il Grido
Il Grido(1957)
7.45

A sugar-refinery worker flees his Northern Italy town after a woman refuses his marriage proposal.



Adagio
Adagio(2023)
6.627

Tangled up with blackmail and crooked cops, the son of a former gangster seeks out his father's old friends, who risk everything to save him.



One Way or Another
7.6

Set during a retreat of Christian Democrat politicians who practice spiritual exercises together, it is an allegory of corrupted power. Disturbing, claustrophobic settings are the background to a series of mysterious crimes.



Made in Italy
6.067

Riko is an honest and hardworking man who can count on a group of real friends and a loving wife. Things change after he loses his job and experiences a midlife crisis.



The Cat o' Nine Tails

A newsman works with a blind puzzle-solver to uncover a deadly conspiracy linked to a genetic research facility.



Colonel Redl
6.9

Set during the fading glory of the Austro-Hungarian empire, the film tells of the rise and fall of Alfred Redl, an ambitious young officer who proceeds up the ladder to become head of the Secret Police only to become ensnared in political deception.



Piazza Fontana: The Italian Conspiracy

On December 12, 1969, a bomb kills 17 people at the Piazza Fontana national bank in Milan, Italy, marking the beginning of the Years of Lead. Local anarchists are scapegoated for the massacre by police and the media, but a lone prosecutor uncovers a conspiracy of far-right groups, corrupt secret services, and other interests that seek to undermine democracy.



The Key
The Key(1983)
5.984

Art professor Nino Rolfe attempts to break down his wife Teresa's conventional modesty. Noticing her affection for their daughter's fiancé, Nino instigates her sexual interest in him - setting off a chain of unexpected events and emotional complications...



The Conspirators
7.6

Rome, 1825. Bishop Rivarola and Colonel Nardoni are in charge of suppressing the liberal revolution. Shoemaker Cornacchia got the information that the liberal Filippo Spada is a spy and is going to denounce his revolutionary companions.



A Drama of Jealousy (and other things)

Construction worker Oreste and young fiancee Adelaide meet Nello, a cook in a pizzeria. This love triangle often goes to communist rallies, and enjoys the filthy beaches of Ostia. Will the hostile environment pave a way to jealousy?



The Forbidden City
7.081

In the suburbs of Rome two very different souls intersect. One is the son of a restaurant owner who disappeared with his lover. The other is a young mysterious woman who has arrived from China in search of her missing sister.



The Day of the Owl
7.1

Set in Sicily, this violent crime drama tells the tale of an Italian cop who heads to a small island town to look into the death of a construction supplier. Once there he is shocked by the influence the Mafia has over the people and even himself.



Secret Ceremony
6

A penniless woman meets a strange girl who insists she is her long-lost mother and becomes enmeshed in a web of deception, and perhaps madness.



Al lupo, al lupo
6.3

Vanni, Gregorio and Livia are brothers. The first is a well-known pianist, the second has abandoned his career as an aspiring violinist to become a deejay. When Vanni discovers that his father has disappeared into thin air, together with Gregorio they decide to call his sister Livia. The three relatives travel the length and breadth of Tuscany to find their missing parent.



The Assassin
6.8

Suave antiques dealer Alfredo Martelli is picked up by the police with no justification. At the precinct, Martelli realizes what the investigation is all about-- that he is the main suspect in the killing of his wealthy ex-lover. Is he guilty, or is he just a sleaze?



The Fascist
6.848

1944. Primo Arcovazzi is a fanatical and dim-witted Fascist Party militiaman who accepts to escort an opponent of the regime to Rome in the hope of be promoted — still oblivious as ever to the forthcoming fall of the regime.



The Shadow of the Day
6.415

Italy, after the promulgation of the racial laws (1938). Luciano, a Fascist-abiding restaurateur, nonetheless believes he can still live by his own rules inside his business. However, everything changes when Anna, a girl with a dangerous secret, starts to work at his restaurant.



The Sunday Woman
6.416

Police commissioner Santamaria is investigating the murder of the ambiguous architect Mr. Garrone. The investigations soon drive him into the Torino's high society. Santamaria suspect Anna Carla and at the same time falls in love for her. Lello is the lover of Massimo, Anna Carla’s gay friend. He is following another direction in order to find out the truth, and his results are confusing the Policeman. But another murder happens...



The Facts of Murder

A police inspector comes into contact with people of all types and dispositions during a grueling murder investigation.



The Great Silence
7.3

Villa Primic was once a luxurious home. Now in disrepair, the Primic family home is up for sale by the owner, Rose, and her two heirs, Massimiliano and Adele. The head of the family, Valerio, is vehemently opposed to this. The reunion is going to be complicated...



Ovosodo
Ovosodo(1997)
7.2

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



Cetto c'è, senzadubbiamente

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.



The Hawks and the Sparrows

A man and his son take an allegorical stroll through life with a talking bird that spouts social and political philosophy.



The Whip and the Body
6.376

Disowned in the past by his father, Kurt Menliff, a cruel and sadistic nobleman, returns to the family castle to reclaim his inheritance.



We Still Kill the Old Way

A leftist professor wants the truth about two men killed during a hunting party; but the mafia, the Church and corrupt politicians don't want him to learn it.



Do You Like Hitchcock?

A nerdy film student and lifelong voyeur begins to believe that two lovely young strangers may have conspired to commit a brutal murder.



Appassionata
5.709

Two teenage friends conspire to find out how much their youthful sensuality can disrupt one of their households, headed by a dentist and his mentally-ill wife.



Don't Torture a Duckling

A reporter and a promiscuous young woman try to solve a series of child killings in a remote southern Italian town rife with superstition and a distrust of outsiders.



Seduced and Abandoned

The film presents the tale of Agnese Ascalone, daughter of prominent miner Vincenzo Ascalone, and takes place in a small town in Sicily. Agnese is seduced by her sister Matilde's fiancé, and has a tryst with him for which she confesses and tries to repent, only to be discovered by her mother and father.



Spasmo
Spasmo(1974)
6.059

While walking along the beach, Christian and his girlfriend discover a mysterious woman washed ashore. The following day, Christian meets the woman again at a yacht party and soon finds himself entangled in a web of lust, intrigue and murder.



Omicidio all'italiana
6.293

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.



Paranoia
Paranoia(1969)
5.9

Following the death of her wealthy husband, American widow Kathryn West migrates to Italy and takes up a reclusive existence in a luxurious villa. After quickly succumbing to the charms of a local man, she lets him move into the villa and the two are later joined by his sister, which soon leads to complications.



Cinema Paradiso
8.4

A filmmaker recalls his childhood, when he fell in love with the movies at his village's theater and formed a deep friendship with the theater's projectionist.



The Red Queen Kills Seven Times

After the death of their grandfather, two sisters inherit their family castle, which is said to be haunted by the Red Queen, whom legend says claims seven lives every hundred years. When a mysterious woman in a red cloak starts targeting their circle of friends, the sisters begin to suspect there might be some truth to the legend.



Il Divo
Il Divo(2008)
7.6

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.



Red Desert
7.343

In an industrializing Italian town, a married woman, rendered mentally unstable after a traffic accident, drifts into an affair with a friend of her husband.



Sandra
Sandra(1965)
6.994

Sandra returns to her childhood village to take care of family business, but childhood memories and secrets soon overcome her.



A Pure Formality
7.417

Onoff is a famous writer, now a recluse. The Inspector is suspicious when Onoff is brought into the station one night, disoriented and suffering a kind of amnesia. In an isolated, rural police station, the Inspector tries to establish the events surrounding a killing, to reach a startling resolution.



A Quiet Life
6.5

The story of a man who murdered thirty-two people, gained power, and then got afraid because too many people wanted to kill him. One August morning, he disappeared. For fifteen years, everyone believed him dead.



The Hunt
The Hunt(2012)
8.095

A teacher lives a lonely life, all the while struggling over his son’s custody. His life slowly gets better as he finds love and receives good news from his son, but his new luck is about to be brutally shattered by an innocent little lie.



Unlikely Revolutionaries

Five ordinary people disillusioned with politics—a perennial temp, a docker, a university professor, a TV reporter, and a convict—decide to kidnap a politician, to dispense justice and use the ransom money to compensate the family of a blue-collar worker who died in workplace accident.



The Illusion
6.814

1860. Giuseppe Garibaldi began from Quarto the adventure of the Thousand surrounded by the enthusiasm of the young idealists who had come from all regions of Italy, and with his loyal group of officers, among whom a new profile stands out, that of Palermo Colonel Vincenzo Giordano Orsini. Among the many militiamen recruited were two Sicilians, Domenico Tricò, a farmer who had emigrated to the North, and Rosario Spitale, an illusionist. Having landed in Sicily, at Marsala, the Thousand begin fighting with the Bourbon army, whose numerical preponderance is immediately evident. Under these conditions, it appears almost impossible for the general to breach the enemy defense and penetrate Palermo. But when he is almost forced to retreat, Garibaldi devises an ingenious plan.



Moebius
Moebius(1996)
6.2

Deep within Buenos Aires's labyrinthine subway system, a train mysteriously disappears along with its 30 passengers. The subway officials are greatly troubled and call in topographer Daniel Pratt to help them find it. Unfortunately, the tunnels are so vast and complex, that Pratt needs his mentor Hugo Mistein to help him. Unfortunately, he has vanished too.



The Seduction of Mimi
7.103

Voting against the Mafia in what he thinks is a secret ballot costs Sicilian laborer Mimi his livelihood. He leaves his wife, flees to Turin and romances a Communist organizer – but he just can’t shake the Mafia. When they lure Mimi back to Sicily with a better job, he must keep his lover – and love child – under wraps. That’s when his wife announces she’s pregnant.



The Fifth Cord
6.514

A journalist finds himself on the trail of a murderer who's been targeting people around him, while the police are considering him a suspect in their investigation.



The Collini Case
7.38

A young lawyer stumbles upon a vast conspiracy while investigating a brutal murder case.



The Birds, the Bees and the Italians

An anthology film that presents three storylines, all set in the Italian town of Treviso. In the first story, a husband pretends to be impotent as a cover for having an affair. In the second, a bank clerk abandons his wife for his mistress, but the rest of the town's husbands become jealous and unite to conspire against them. In the third, men of the town all seduce a promiscuous teenager, but her father eventually reveals that she is underage, and they face prosecution for statutory rape.



Bianca
Bianca(1984)
7.5

Eccentric and full of manias, Michele is a young high school professor who defines himself as “not used to happiness”. He realizes his life is meaningless if he doesn’t have a woman by his side but, after a series of rather disastrous experiences, he feels more alone than ever. Then, out of the blue, a new French teacher called Bianca arrives at school. Amongst uncertainties and contradictions, the two start dating. In the meantime, a series of homicides take place and a police officer begins to suspect that Michele is involved. Bianca will save him providing an alibi at the right moment, but then, everything goes wrong again.



Deep in the Wood
6.055

When young Tommi goes missing during a festival in the Dolomites in 2010, his parents are devastated. Five years later, a boy is found with no name or records; DNA tests prove it is Tommi. But while Tommi's father Manuel welcomes him back with open arms, his mother Linda is not convinced that it is her son. Suspicion and superstition permeate the pores of this eerie mystery thriller.



The Leopard
7.7

As Garibaldi's troops begin the unification of Italy in the 1860s, an aristocratic Sicilian family grudgingly adapts to the sweeping social changes undermining their way of life. Proud but pragmatic Prince Don Fabrizio Salina allows his war hero nephew, Tancredi, to marry Angelica, the beautiful daughter of gauche, bourgeois Don Calogero, in order to maintain the family's accustomed level of comfort and political clout.



Commediasexi
4.192

Congressman Bonfili, a family man and promoter in the Italian Parliament of a family law, has a clandestine affair with a feisty starlet wannabe actress. In his murky scheming, he also involves his blameless private driver.



Man of Marble
7

A young Polish filmmaker sets out to find out what happened to Mateusz Birkut, a bricklayer who became a propaganda hero in the 1950s but later fell out of favor and disappeared.



7 Women and a Murder
5.538

When the family patriarch is murdered, seven women find themselves trapped together in his mansion to solve the mystery.



The Beast
The Beast(2020)
6.144

To rescue his daughter, an unstable Special Forces veteran unleashes his inner beast as he pursues her kidnappers — and soon becomes a suspect himself.



The Quietude
6.1

Against the backdrop of a military dictatorship, Eugenia is reunited with her estranged family following her father’s stroke and is forced to confront dark secret.



Almost Blue
6

A police inspector suspects a serial killer is afoot in the university city of Bologna, luring in his victims through online video chats before murdering them and assuming their identity.



Strangeness
6.865

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.



Into the Labyrinth
6.4

When a kidnapping victim turns up alive after fifteen years, a profiler and a private investigator try to piece together the mystery.



The Family
7.444

"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.



Rugantino
Rugantino(1973)
5.9

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 Stendhal Syndrome

A young policewoman slowly goes insane while tracking down an elusive serial rapist/killer through Italy when she herself becomes a victim of the brutal man's obsession.



Well-Off People
4.807

Umberto Maria Durloni is a successful lawyer and a socialite who likes parties and a lavish life. He's got it all, except any ethical qualms.Only a step away from the top, his perfect world crumbles, showing him the brutal do downside to his life.



Couch Potatoes
5.2

Giorgio and Tito, father and son. A successful journalist and a lazy teenager apparently impossible to understand. Giorgio's dream is to take Tito to the Nasca Hill in Liguria, but Tito prefers to spend his entire day with his group of friends, eating, talking about nothing and playing video games. Until one day when he suddenly informs his father that he would join him in this trip. After a series of accidents and misunderstandings, at the end, somehow father and son will find the way to communicate … or at least they will try.



Oedipus Rex
6.7

In pre-war Italy, a young couple have a baby boy. The father, however, is jealous of his son - and the scene moves to antiquity, where the baby is taken into the desert to be killed. He is rescued, given the name Oedipus, and brought up by the King and Queen of Corinth as their son. One day an oracle informs Oedipus that he is destined to kill his father and marry his mother. Horrified, he flees Corinth and his supposed parents - only to get into a fight and kill an older man on the road…



The Right Distance
6.936

The arrival of an attractive young teacher in a small town in the Po valley disturbs the drowsy life of the place, leading eventually to a murder.



Juliet of the Spirits

Middle-aged Giulietta grows suspicious of her husband, Giorgio, when his behavior grows increasingly questionable. One night when Giorgio initiates a seance amongst his friends, Giulietta gets in touch with spirits and learns more about herself and her painful past. Slightly skeptical, but intrigued, she visits a mystic who gives her more information -- and nudges her toward the realization that her husband is indeed a philanderer.



Viva l'Italia
6.274

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

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