Lo Sceicco bianco. Nino Rota

The first two days of a marriage. Ivan Cavalli (Leopoldo Trieste), a punctilious clerk brings his virginal bride Wanda (Brunella Bovo) to Rome for a honeymoon, an audience with the Pope, and to present her to his uncle. They arrive early in the morning, and he has time for a nap. She sneaks off to find the offices of a romance magazine she reads religiously: she wants to meet "The White Sheik" (Alberto Sordi) he hero of a soap-opera photo strip. Star-struck, she ends up 20 miles from Rome, alone on a boat with the sheik. A distraught Ivan covers for her, claiming she's ill. That night, each wanders the streets, she tempted by suicide, he meets the prostitute Cabiria (Giuletta Masina). The next day, at 11, is their papal audience. Can things still right themselves?
Federico Fellini recalls he became enamoured of the music of Nino Rota, during the filming of the pair’s initial collaboration on 1952: “I had grown affectionate to that soundtrack and I would not change it. Nino agreed immediately with me, saying the tunes I had used for shooting were really beautiful. It was just what was needed, he said, I couldn’t do better. He said just this, and meanwhile, he was toying with his fingers on the piano keyboard. What was this, I asked after a while? What were you playing? And, looking absent-minded, he replied, when? Now, I insisted, while you were speaking. You played something. Indeed, said Nino? I don’t know, I don’t remember. And he kept caressing the keys, seemingly at random, here and there smiling at me, looking as if he wanted to reassure me.”