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 When the Music Box Theatre presented its 70-millimeter series a few months ago, I was most impressed with those movies that used the large-scale format for metaphysical reasons. "The high-resolution film renders things with such specificity that even minute details appear to have been prearranged," I wrote,  going on to say that The Master,2001, and Playtime took advantage of this quality to "ponder whether everything may be part of some mysterious cosmic order." 

 Italy's supreme Court of Cassation on Tuesday rejected a petition from Silvio Berlusconi's lawyers to recuse one of three Milan judges who handed the ex-premier a one-year prison term for involvement in the publication of an illegally obtained wiretap. 

 France considers itself the world center of wine. But there may be some red faces in Burgundy today—because a study provides more evidence that the techniques for turning grapes into a glass of wine may have come over from what today is Italy. The research is in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.  

 Italy’s Prime Minister Enrico Letta has apologized to unemployed Italian young people who must leave the debt-stricken country to find jobs, after the nation’s unemployment rate reached its highest level in at least 36 years.