From Sophia Loren to Monica Bellucci, 17 Times Italian Bombshells Ruled the Venice Film Festival

Just as Cannes has its effortlessly chic French girls, the Venice Film Festival has always been the undisputed domain of the Italian bombshell. Since the showcase’s inception nine decades ago, these impossibly glamorous women have shimmied off their private water taxis and onto the Lido in showstopping ball gowns, with dramatic cat eyes and lashings of mascara, their hair teased up to perfection and eye-wateringly expensive jewels draped around their necks. Among them were Fellini heroines like Claudia Cardinale; Michelangelo Antonioni’s bewitching muse Monica Vitti; the always elegant Sophia Loren; and Monica Bellucci, still the very definition of va-va-voom.

As we count down to the event’s 81st edition, we look back at some of its guests’ most dazzling moments from festivals past.