A Farewell to Arms

The Hollywood producer David Oliver Selznick chose Friuli for this film, based on the novel by Ernest Hemingway. Among the exceptional cast, is an outstanding Rock Hudson, Jennifer Jones, Vittorio de Sica and Alberto Sordi. The film tells the story of Frederick Henry, a young American journalist wounded on the Italian front and admitted to a hospital in Milan. Here, his doctor friend Rinaldi introduces him to Catherine, a beautiful English nurse. She and Frederick fall madly in love and he wants to marry her but, just healed, is sent to the front a few days before the Battle of Caporetto.
Carnia, a mountainous area in the North-West of Fruli Venezia Giulia, is the heart of the film. The director Vidor is struck by the beauty of natural landscapes and chose as the location the military road towards Tugliezzo above Stazione per la Carnia and the old mill on the plain of Santa Caterina. Most of the exterior and the interior scenes were shot in Venzone. Among the latter, some scenes were shot in the ‘Palazzo Orgnani Martina’ Building, dating back to the XIII century, and the XVIII stately mansion ‘Palazzo Zinutti’ Building.