The Casa del Cinema is a city-run movie theater and exhibition space in Rome. It is located inside the Villa Borghese park and will be used for several events and movie showings during the annual International Film Festival of Rome.
Casa del Cinema Rome
Address, opening hours and admission
Address: Largo Marcello Mastroianni, 1 – Rome (tel. +39 06 423601). Opening hours and admission depend on the event.
History and description
The history of the Casa del Cinema starts in 1833, when the Borghese enlarged the Villa Pinciana through the acquisition of some adjacent vineyards and confining villas. One of these was the Villa Manfroni Bernini, which bordered the Aurelian Wall near the Porta Pinciana.
At the time there was a building consisting of an older and a newer part, the newer being lower and less refined. The building was restored by the architect Luigi Canina to be used as a restaurant, but after having been damaged during fights between Mazzini and the French troops (1849) ended up being used as a stable for cows and a milk factory.
When the Villa Borghese became property of the city of Rome (1903) the Casina kept being used that way, but in the 1930’s it was transformed into a luxury restaurant called Villa Umberto-Casino delle Rose.
The next transformation came in the 60’s when it became a dancing, called “La Lucciola”. In 1976 the owners made some unauthorized modifications to the building and only after 25 years of legal wrangling restoration work was started, guided by the use of early 20th photographs.
The Casa del Cinema was inaugurated in the building in 2004. There are three projection halls (Sala Deluxe, Sala Kodak and Sala Gian Maria Volontà), two exhibition spaces, a cafe (the Cinecaffé) and a restaurant (Casina delle Rose) in the building.
The two exhibition spaces have been named after the directors Sergio Amidei and Cesare Zavattini, representing Italian cinema “from A to Z”.
During the summer there are open air theater performances.