Obscenity Conviction On Lollobrigida Quashed

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31339, 8 April 1967, Page 13

Obscenity Conviction On Lollobrigida Quashed

(N .Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright) ROME, April 6. A Rome appeal court tonight lifted an obscenity conviction and twomonth suspended gaol sentence against the actress Gina Lollobrigida for her seduction scenes in the film “Le Bambole.” The Court reduced the verdict to “performing contrary to public decency,” a minor offence for which Miss Lollobrigida cannot be punished because it falls under a recent amnesty. Similar sentences were awarded to her co-star, the French actor Jean Sorel and the film’s producer-director. The Court handed down the verdict after watching the film in which Miss Lollobrigida [flays the part of an alluring hotel receptionist

who seduces the young nephew Sorel of a bishop who comes to Rome for the Vatican Council.

The film was an updated version of a tale by the 14th century Italian writer, Giovanni Boccaccio. The scene which caused the trouble showed Miss Lollobrigida, who is 40, sitting on a bed half-draped in a sheet with Sorel beside her. Cinema-goers had objected that she appeared- nude but the defence claimed she wore flesh-coloured tights.