60s Filmstar Claudia Cardinale Honored in Tunisian Birthplace

Italian-Tunisian actress Claudia Cardinale (2nd-L) poses in front of a mural of her during a street naming ceremony in her honor in Tunisia FETHI BELAID AFP
Italian-Tunisian actress Claudia Cardinale (2nd-L) poses in front of a mural of her during a street naming ceremony in her honor in Tunisia FETHI BELAID AFP
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60s Filmstar Claudia Cardinale Honored in Tunisian Birthplace

Italian-Tunisian actress Claudia Cardinale (2nd-L) poses in front of a mural of her during a street naming ceremony in her honor in Tunisia FETHI BELAID AFP
Italian-Tunisian actress Claudia Cardinale (2nd-L) poses in front of a mural of her during a street naming ceremony in her honor in Tunisia FETHI BELAID AFP

Actress Claudia Cardinale may have been a sixties legend of Italian and French cinema, but in Tunisia, in the portside district where she grew up, she says she feels "at home".

"I left very young, but I spent my whole childhood here, my adolescence," said Cardinale, now 84. "My origins are here."

To celebrate her connection to the North African country, authorities on Sunday named a street after her in the La Goulette suburb of the capital Tunis, where petals were scattered in a ceremony in her honor.

"You marked the world of cinema for almost half a century with your dazzling beauty, your charisma and through the roles you played," said Amel Limam, the mayor of La Goulette.

"I am very honored, because it is here that I was born and spent my childhood," Cardinale said. "I kiss you!"

The multicultural beachfront neighborhood was once home to a sizeable Sicilian population -- including Cardinale's parents.

Before Tunisia's independence from France in 1956, more than 130,000 Italians were residents, and many of their ancestors had settled there before French colonial rule.

"I still keep a lot of Tunisia inside me -- the scenery, the people, sense of welcome, the openness," Cardinale told AFP.

'We're all equal'
In 1957, aged 19, Cardinale won a beauty contest for "the prettiest Italian" in newly independent Tunisia.

Her prize was a trip to the Venice film festival, where she caught the eye of influential cinema figures.

That led to her first film role, in Mario Monicelli's Le Pigeon.

Soon afterwards, she moved with her family to Rome to pursue her career, which took off with a role in Luchino Visconti's film The Leopard, alongside French film star Alain Delon and Hollywood legend Burt Lancaster.

That was the start of a long career that has continued into her 80s. After starring in The Pink Panther opposite David Niven in 1963, she shot to attention in the United States and Britain.

In one of her latest roles, she plays a grandmother in a film by Tunisia's Ridha Behi, "L'ile du Pardon", currently in post-production.

Her parents never recovered from their departure from Tunisia, which they experienced as an exile.

"It was very hard. My father never wanted to come back, that's how much he dreaded the pain of what was for him a real heartbreak," she said.

"My mother recreated Tunisia in Italy. She planted all Tunisian plants and kept on cooking Tunisian meals."

But Cardinale said the Tunisian sense of hospitality can be a model for how to treat migrants.

The country "can and should be proud of its history," she said.

And in an era when many Tunisians are willing to risk their lives boarding unseaworthy boats to reach Europe, she stresses the importance of "remembering this shared past to build the future".

"The wind changes, and we're all equal in terms of the need to leave," she said.

"Tunisia for us was a welcoming land. I wish everyone in the world who needs to leave somewhere could receive the same welcome."


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Marty McFly grabbed a guitar in “Back to the Future” and rocked out with the band at a 1950s high school dance, helping him narrowly avoid blinking out of existence before time-traveling back to the 1980s.

The guitar, in real life, wasn't as lucky.

Filmmakers went looking for the instrument while making the movie's 1989 sequel, but even now it's nowhere to be found. Four decades after the blockbuster film debuted, the guitar's creator has launched a search for the iconic Cherry Red Gibson ES-345.

Gibson, which is based in Nashville, is asking the public for help tracking it down as the movie turns 40 and as the company produces a new documentary about the search and the film, “Lost to the Future.”

In a video by Gibson, with the movie's theme song playing in the background, “Back to the Future” stars such as Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson and Harry Waters Jr. make a cinematic plea. There's also a surprise appearance by Huey Lewis, whose band Huey Lewis and the News performed the soundtrack's headliner song, “The Power of Love.”

Lloyd, in the cadence of Doc Brown, says in the video that the guitar has been “lost to the future.”

“It's somewhere lost in the space-time continuum,” says Fox, who played McFly. “Or it's in some Teamster's garage.”

In the film, McFly steps in for an injured band member at the 1955 school dance with the theme “Enchantment under the Sea,” playing the guitar as students slow dance to “Earth Angel.” He then leads Marvin Barry and the Starlighters in a rendition of “Johnny B. Goode,” calling it an oldie where he comes from even though the 1958 song doesn't exist yet for his audience.

Fox said he wanted McFly to riff through his favorite guitarists' signature styles — Jimi Hendrix behind the head, Pete Townshend's windmill and the Eddie Van Halen hammer. After digging and dancing to “Johnny B. Goode,” the students at the dance fall into an awkward silence as McFly's riffs turn increasingly wild.

“I guess you guys aren't ready for that yet,” McFly says. “But your kids are gonna love it.”