Not to be missed: a recent restoration of the acclaimed classic that won Sophia Loren the Best Actress award at the Cannes Film Festival and the Academy Award for Best Actress – the first time any non-English speaking role had garnered that prize. ("Before I made Two Women, I had been a performer," Loren said. "Afterward, I was an actress.") In De Sica's stunning adaptation of the Alberto Moravia novel, Loren plays Cesira (a role that was reportedly first offered to Anna Magnani, who turned it down), a shopkeeper who flees from Rome, along with her adolescent daughter Rosetta (Eleanora Brown), to escape the Allied bombardment during the last days of World War II. In the mountains of her native Ciociara, the hard-nosed widow finds refuge with her people and strikes up a flirtation with an idealistic young intellectual (Jean-Paul Belmondo); however, she soon discovers that even her financial cunning offers no protection from the ravages of war.