Italy Excellently Prevails in The Oscar Record

In more than 70 years of existence of the Academy Awards, no country has ever defeated the record of Italy for having the most number of hits winning. Italy now owns the record for having 12 grandiose movies winning Best Foreign Language Film in the past 60 years. Well, this is not really that surprising since Italy was the first country to ever rake in the award when it was introduced in 1947, particularly when "Shoeshine," directed by the genius Vittorio De Sica, achieved the trophy. To top it off, Italy once again got the exceptional honor in 1949 when De Sica made his arresting film, "The Bicycle Thief."

In 1956, as a formal category, Italy won again when "La Strada," directed by the film supreme Federico Fellini, achieved the honor. The Italian film honor was repeated the following year through Fellini's imaginative work, "Nights of Cabiria," and in 1963.

What followed were legions of Oscars through the film of Italian supremes De Sica and Fellini. De Sica achieved an Oscar for "Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow" in 1964 and for "The Garden of the Finzi-Continis" in 1971, while Fellini achieved an Oscar in "8 1/2" in 1963, and Amarcord in 1974.

Other amazing Italian movies winning this very exceptional award were "Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion" by Elio Petri in 1970, "Nuovo Cinema Paradiso" by Giuseppe Tornatore in 1989, "Mediterraneo" by Gabriele Salvatores, and "Life Is Beautiful" by Roberto Benigni in 1998.