Ammon News - Claudia Cardinale, a glamorous symbol of post-war Italian cinema who enjoyed a long and varied acting career on film and in the theatre, has died at age 87, according to AFP and other French media.

Raised in Tunisia to a family of Sicilian origin, Cardinale's introduction to the movie world came in 1957 after she won a beauty contest in Tunis and was rewarded with a trip to the Venice film festival.

Her voice had to be dubbed for her first Italian screen roles because she had grown up in a family where Sicilian dialect was spoken and had been educated at a French-speaking school.

After a series of smaller roles, she shot to international fame in 1963 when she featured in Federico Fellini's "8-1/2" while she also starred alongside Burt Lancaster in "The Leopard" in the same year.

Her growing profile opened the door to Hollywood productions and she appeared in the comedy caper "The Pink Panther", directed by Blake Edwards, and Sergio Leone's "Once Upon A Time In the West" in 1968.

Cardinale's career took a hit in the 1970s, after she separated from film producer Franco Cristaldi to start a life-long relationship with filmmaker Pasquale Squitieri, with whom she had a daughter, also called Claudia.

She carried on making films in a variety of European languages until late in her life, appearing in Swiss TV series Bulle in 2020.
Awarded a lifetime achievement at the Berlin Film Festival back in 2002, she said acting had been a great career.

"I've lived more than 150 lives, prostitute, saint, romantic, every kind of woman, and that is marvellous to have this opportunity to change yourself," she said.

Reuters