Monica Bellucci

Stunningly beautiful Italian actress and fashion model Monica Bellucci (1964) is one of the few major European film stars of the last decades. Her role of Sci-Fi vixen Persephone in the Matrix series made her a worldwide sex symbol. Other remarkable roles include Mary Magdalene in Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ (2004) and Lucia Sciarra in Spectre (2015), the oldest Bond girl in the history of the franchise.


Chinese postcard by Oriental City Publishing Group.


Dutch postcard by Film Freak Productions, Zoetermeer, no. FA 344, 1992. Photo: Columbia Pictures. Keanu Reeves, Michaela Bercu, Monica Bellucci and Florina Kendrick in Dracula (Francis Coppola, 1992).


French postcard by Sonis, no. F. 103. Photo: Warner Bros. Monica Bellucci in The Matrix Reloaded (Lana Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski, 2003).

One of Dracula's Brides

Monica Anna Maria Bellucci was born in Città di Castello, Italy in 1964 (some sources cite 1968 or 1969). She was the only child of painter Brunella Briganti and Pasquale Bellucci, an owner of a trucking company, and she grew up in San Giustino.

Bellucci began modeling at age 13 by posing for a local photo enthusiast. However, she thought she would be an attorney, but dropped out of the University of Perugia when a modelling career beckoned. In 1988, Bellucci moved to fashion centre Milan, where she signed with Elite Model Management.

By 1989, she was becoming prominent as a fashion model in Paris and New York City. She posed for Dolce & Gabbana and French Elle, among others. In that year, Bellucci made the transition to acting and began taking acting classes.

Bellucci's film career began with a part opposite Giancarlo Giannini in the TV film Vita coi figli/Life with kids (Dino Risi), 1990. That year she married Claudio Carlos Basso, but they divorced four years later.

She played a leading role in La Riffa/The raffle (Francesco Laudadio, 1991) with Massimo Ghini, and was one of Count Dracula's brides in Bram Stoker's Dracula (Francis Ford Coppola, 1992).

In 1996 she was nominated for a César Award for Best Supporting Actress for her portrayal of Lisa in L'Appartement/The Apartment (Gilles Mimouni, 1996). In England, it won the BAFTA Award for Best Film Not in the English Language. The film was also a modest box office success in France, the Netherlands, and other European countries. Her co-star in this film was French actor Vincent Cassel, with whom she married in 1999. They have appeared together in several films since, and have two daughters, Deva (2004) and Léonie (2010).


Chinese postcard by Oriental City Publishing Group.


Chinese postcard by Oriental City Publishing Group.

Cleopatra and Persephone

Monica Bellucci became known and popular with worldwide audiences when she played the title role in the romantic drama Malèna (Giuseppe Tornatore, 2000). Malèna is the tale of a 13-year-old boy's obsession with a beautiful woman in a small Sicilian town during World War II. Malèna is a quiet young bride who is left alone in a small Sicilian town when her husband goes off to fight in World War II.

Stunningly attractive, she struggles to keep her dignity as she is spurned by the female villagers and preyed upon by the men. Bellucci followed this hit with roles in two other successful films. She was a courtesan in the French horror film Le Pacte des loups/Brotherhood of the Wolf (Christophe Gans, 2001) with Samuel LeBihan, and a rape victim in the violent drama Irréversible/Irreversible (Gaspar Noé, 2002) with Vincent Cassel. The latter created a stir when the film - in which Bellucci endures a brutal, nine-minute rape scene - premiered at the Cannes Film Festival.

Aubry Anne D'Arminio (AllMovie) about Le Pacte des loups/Brotherhood of the Wolf: "The stylish cross between period piece and kung-fu flick (which also starred Cassel) was the fourth most successful film of its year in France. After conquering Europe, the film became an art house hit in the States and Bellucci received a nomination for Best Supporting Actress from the U.S. Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Films."

She became the subject of numerous fan sites and men's magazine articles. In the cinema she appeared as Cleopatra in Astérix & Obélix: Mission Cléopâtre/Asterix & Obelix: Mission Cleopatra (Alain Chabat, 2002), starring Christian Clavier and Gérard Depardieu and based on the comic book 'Astérix et Cléopatre' by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo.

The following year she played Persephone in the highly anticipated follow-ups to The Matrix (1999), The Matrix Reloaded (2003), and The Matrix Revolutions (2003), both directed by the Wachowski's, and starring Keanu Reeves.

She then got the role of Mary Magdalene in Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ (2004) featuring Jim Caviezel. The film covers the final 12 hours of Jesus' life, beginning with the Agony in the Garden and ending with a brief depiction of his resurrection. The violent and highly controversial production was a blockbuster. Worldwide, The Passion of the Christ earned more than $600,000,000.


Chinese postcard by Oriental City Publishing Group.


Chinese postcard by Oriental City Publishing Group.

Mirror Queen

In 2004, while pregnant with her daughter Deva, Monica Bellucci posed nude for the Italian Vanity Fair Magazine in protest against Italian laws, that prevent the use of donor sperm. From 2006 to 2010, she was the face of a range of Dior products.

She kept working in international films. She was the Mirror Queen in The Brothers Grimm (Terry Gilliam, 2005), starring Matt Damon and Heath Ledger in an exaggerated and fictitious portrait of the Brothers Grimm as travelling con-artists in French-occupied Germany during the early 19th century.

In the French thriller Ne te retourne pas/Don't Look Back (Marina de Van, 2009), she co-starred with Sophie Marceau. She played a sorceress in the fantasy adventure film The Sorcerer's Apprentice (John Turteltaub, 2010) with Nicolas Cage, and a Bosnian woman in The Whistleblower (Larysa Kondracki, 2010) with Rachel Weisz.

In 2012 Monica Bellucci became the new face of Dolce & Gabbana and she also made the film Fasle Kargadan/Rhino Season (2012) for Iranian director Bahman Ghobadi, and the French film Des gens qui s'embrassent/People Who Embrace (Daniele Thompson, 2013). In 2013, she and Vincent Cassel divorced.

She played Lucia Sciarra in Spectre (Sam Mendes, 2015) opposite Daniel Craig as James Bond. At the age of 50, Bellucci became the oldest Bond girl in the history of the franchise. She had previously auditioned for the role of Paris Carver in Tomorrow Never Dies (Roger Spottiswoode, 1997), but was passed over in favour of Teri Hatcher. Spectre grossed over $880 million worldwide, making it the sixth-highest-grossing film of 2015.

A year later, Monica Bellucci played a bride in the midst of the Bosnian War in On the Milky Road (Emir Kusturica, 2016). Her recent films include the French drama Les plus belles années d'une vie/The Best Years of a Life (Claude Lelouch, 2019) with Jean-Louis Trintignant and Anouk Aimée, and the upcoming American thriller Memory (Martin Campbell, 2022) with Liam Neeson and Guy Pearce.


French postcard by Sonis, no. C. 322. Photo: Columbia Pictures. Keanu Reeves, Michaela Bercu, Monica Bellucci, and Florina Kendrick in Dracula (Francis Coppola, 1992).


Trailer for Malèna (2000). Source: BratvaTv (YouTube).


Trailer Irréversible/Irreversible (2002). Source: Gabtor70 (YouTube).


Trailer for Fasle Kargadan/Rhino Season (2012). Source: Mijfilm (YouTube).

Sources: Aubry Anne D'Arminio (AllMovie), Film Reference, NNDB, Wikipedia, and IMDb.

This post was last updated on 22 December 2021.