Valerio Zurlini (19 March 1926 – 26 October 1982) was an Italian stage and film director and screenwriter. During his law studies in Rome , he started working in the theatre. In 1943, he joined the Italian resistance . Zurlini became a member of the Italian Communist Party . He filmed short documentaries in the immediate post-war period before he directed his first feature film in 1954, The Girls of San Frediano . In 1958, Zurlini won the Nastro d'Argento together with Leonardo Benvenuti , Piero De Bernardi and Alberto Lattuada for Best Script for Lattuada's Guendalina . Zurlini made his name as a director with his second feature film, Violent Summer (1959), starring Eleonora Rossi Drago and Jean Louis Trintignant . In 1961, Zurlini filmed Girl with a Suitcase , starring Claudia Cardinale , who became a film star in Italy, and Jacques Perrin , who would become Zurlini's favorite act…
