Matera - Culture

Culture

Because of the ancient and primitive scenery in and around the Sassi, it has been used by filmmakers as the setting for ancient Jerusalem. The following famous biblical period motion pictures were filmed in Matera:

  • Pier Paolo Pasolini’s The Gospel According to St. Matthew (1964).
  • Bruce Beresford’s King David (1985).
  • Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ (2004).
  • Catherine Hardwicke’s The Nativity Story (2006).

Other famous movies filmed in the city include:

  • Alberto Lattuada's La Lupa (1953)
  • Giuseppe Tornatore's The Star Maker (1995)
  • The Omen (2006)

A chapter on Matera describing the life of the people living there in the 1930s is in the book Cristo si è fermato a Eboli ("Christ stopped at Eboli") by Carlo Levi. This book was also turned into a film.

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