Fantaghirò, also known as The Cave of the Golden Rose (La Grotta della Rosa d'Oro), is an Italian fantasy romance adventure series consisting of five television films directed by Lamberto Bava and released between 1991 and 1996. The first film was originally based on Italo Calvino's "Fanta-Ghiro the Beautiful", and takes place in a fairy tale setting, featuring princesses, princes, witches, wizards and talking animals.For an in-depth analysis of the evolution of Fantaghirò from its roots in oral folklore to Lamberto Bava's cult television series, see Sottilotta, Elena Emma. "Fantaghirò as an “Artivist” Adaptation: Gender Subversions from Italo Calvino’s Fairy Tale to Lamberto Bava’s Cult TV Series and Contemporary Fan Art." Marvels & Tales: Journal of Fairy-Tale Studies 39.1 (2025). <https://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/marvels/vol39/iss1/9>. Shot mostly in the Czech Republic and Slovakia with the participation of local actors, and highly popular in Italy during the 1990s, it was loosely adapted into a cartoon series of the same title. A reboot series was announced in 2021.
Films
Fantaghirò (1991)
Fantaghirò is the youngest of three princesses born to a warrior king. Although beautiful and intelligent, Fantaghirò causes many problems for her family because she goes against everything expected of a woman in her kingdom by being literate, adventurous, and rebellious; this makes her father furious. One day, the King receives an invitation from the enemy prince Romualdo to a duel that can potentially end the centuries-long war that has been going on between the two kingdoms. While the King learns that only one of his three daughters can win the fight, Fantaghirò sees this as a chance for her to prove herself.
Fantaghirò 2 (1992)
Fantaghirò and Romualdo are due to be married, but their wedding is cut short when news arrives that Fantaghirò's father has been kidnapped by the evil Black Witch, the queen of the Dark Kingdom. The witch demands that the kingdoms of Fantaghirò and Romualdo submit to her rule, but they refuse, and Romualdo declares war. He sets out with his army, leaving behind Fantaghirò, who has sworn not to lift another weapon for the rest of her life. Now, forced to break her oath, Fantaghirò secretly sets out to the Dark Kingdom alone to face and defeat the evil queen, who plots to separate Fantaghirò from Romualdo forever and to make him her lover.
Fantaghirò 3 (1993)
The dark wizard Tarabas learns that his powerful kingdom will be defeated by a royal child of no more than ten years of age. He becomes obsessed with learning how this will happen, so he orders his clay warriors to kidnap all of the world's royal children. When the children of Fantaghirò's sisters become targets, Fantaghirò and Romualdo protect them from the attacking clay soldiers. However, during the fight, Romualdo accidentally falls into a cursed river and turns into stone. Fantaghirò then learns that she has to find Tarabas if she wants to save her beloved Romualdo, and for that, she will need the aid of the Black Witch.
Fantaghirò 4 (1994)
A black cloud is travelling throughout the land, destroying everything it touches. When the black cloud consumes Fantaghirò's castle, she allies herself with Prince Parsel to track the black cloud to its origins and stop whoever is casting it. Along the way, Fantaghirò is reunited with the wizard Tarabas, who agrees to help them on their quest and Princess Anjelica, who is in love with Tarabas.
Fantaghirò 5 (1996)
Fantaghirò is captured by the Black Witch, who has been unable to perform her evil magic ever since she helped Fantaghirò in their previous adventures. The witch is about to execute the captured Fantaghirò when the princess is suddenly whisked away into an alternative reality where she has to join forces with a scoundrel named Aries in defeating a child-eating monstrous villain known as the Nameless.
Cancelled sequels The producers planned a further continuation of the series, which would have included two more chapters (sixth and seventh). In these, Fantaghirò would have continued to travel to parallel worlds, each from a different fairy tale, and to our world in the modern era, helping people in need before returning home to her kingdom only to find it an alternative and dark reality where she would face an evil version of herself. Another sequel, Il ritorno di Fantaghirò (The Return of Fantaghirò), was considered by Lamberto Bava and Gianni Romoli in 2007.
Characters Main characters Fantaghirò
Fantaghirò, portrayed by Alessandra Martines, is a strong and beautiful warrior-princess who is the main character in all five films. The youngest princess of three, she is outspoken, rebellious, and courageous, never retreating from a battle. In the first film, she is an impulsive troublemaker who grew up fascinated by weapons and adventure and who likes to provoke her father and sisters, but underneath it, she has a good heart. Fantaghirò is mentored and protected by the White Witch, also known as the White Knight, who teaches her to understand and communicate with animals; her own masculine counter-ego persona's pseudonym is the "Count of Valdoca". After Fantaghirò's mother did not survive childbirth, the baby was taken by the King to the cave where a ferocious beast lived, in order to be sacrificed there. The White Witch appeared for the first time in Fantaghirò's life to save her, explaining to the King the importance of the child.
From the second film onwards, the heroine is accepted as a female knight who will do whatever it takes to protect her loved ones, even if that means sacrificing her own life. She is deeply in love with Romualdo, previously the enemy prince and their kingdoms are now finally at peace thanks to Fantaghirò, who briefly vows to put down her sword forever. After she wins back Romualdo from her evil rival the Black Witch in the second film, they are married in the third film, adopting the orphaned Princess Esmeralda as their daughter. In the third film, Fantaghirò learns the secrets of dark magic from the Black Witch to rescue Romualdo from the evil wizard Tarabas, another of her suitors. In the fifth film, Fantaghirò becomes romantically engaged with Ares, a pirate from another world. She often rides on a white-maned palomino horse.
The series' writer Gianni Romoli said, "What fascinates me about Fantaghirò is that it is a female but also a male character, without any ambiguity. She is a friend, but also a woman partner, the one who both solves your problems and causes them." Fantaghirò has long red-brown hair which she twice cuts with a sword into a boy-cut in the first and second films, but in the third film onwards she only has a boy-cut. She tries to befriend all creatures and people she meets unless they try to harm those she cares about. In the first chapter, Fantaghirò wears a blue and orange tunic, the sky blue and gold being the colours of the heirs to the throne in Italian tradition, before disguising herself as a man in order to fight. She is very forgiving and looks past physical appearances. The role launched Martines' career.
Romualdo
Romualdo, portrayed by Kim Rossi Stuart, is a prince who becomes Fantaghirò's beloved and later her husband. After the death of his father, Romualdo seeks to end the centuries-long war his ancestors have waged against Fantaghirò's people by challenging her father to single combat. He falls in love with Fantaghirò in the first film and becomes obsessed with finding her, even as he is initially confused by her androgynous traits. He is shocked when he meets her properly for the first time, as she has chosen to replace her father as Romualdo's opponent, and is disguised as a man, and experiences an inner conflict over his feeling for his opponent. Eventually, he learns that she is a princess. The two are betrothed and their kingdoms reconcile.
They are due to be married early in the second film, but the ceremony is postponed when the Black Witch kidnaps Fantaghirò's father. Romualdo becomes the witch's next target and she puts a spell on him to make him completely forget about Fantaghirò. He becomes the lover of the Black Witch who sends him as her champion to a duel against Fantaghirò; however, he regains his memories thanks to Fantaghirò and the White Witch. Stuart named his character's alternate persona RomuAltro, saying, "In fact, ensnared by the Black Witch, I change nature. I confess that this new character amused me more than the other."TV Sorissi i Canzoni. N.51/1992.
After that, Romualdo is reduced to a secondary character. In the third film, he is turned into a statue whilst fighting Tarabas' men and is only revived near the end of the movie, when the pair are finally married. In the fourth film, Stuart did not want to return for the role, so Romualdo was transformed into the hideously ugly Fiodor, portrayed by Riccardo Serventi Longhi. At the end of the film, Fiodor is transformed back into Romualdo. Romualdo does not appear at all in the fifth film, except in flashbacks.
Black Witch
The Black Witch (Strega Nera), also known as the Black Queen (Regina Nera), portrayed by Brigitte Nielsen (original Italian dubbing by Aurora Cancian), is the evil counterpart of the White Witch and the self-declared arch-enemy of Princess Fantaghirò. She is introduced in the second film as the vain and cruel ruler of the faraway Dark Kingdom who plots to destroy Fantaghirò and Romualdo's pure romantic relationship. At first, the witch demands to rule their lands, but soon she also begins to desire the handsome prince for herself. She lures them both to her kingdom by kidnapping Fantaghirò's father, who becomes her figurehead, the Dark King. She then turns herself into Fantaghirò to make Romualdo kiss her for a spell that turns him into her slave whom she orders to slay the princess. But Fantaghirò manages to outsmart her rival and the Black Witch is turned to crystal (later retconned to stone) and smashed into pieces. A part of herself is preserved inside Romualdo's mind until it is eradicated by the White Witch as she again comes to Fantaghirò's rescue.
However, the Black Witch's character turned out to be so popular that the director decided to bring her back for all the next chapters of the saga. In the third film, Fantaghirò and the Black Witch's former apprentice minions, Bolt and Lightning, reluctantly restore her to life because Fantaghirò needs the help of her magic against Tarabas, and the witch is forced to teach the princess. At the height of her power in the second film, she could transform herself as well as other living beings and objects near her into anyone or anything at will (including turning herself into an eagle and Fantaghiro into a bullfrog). However, once the Black Witch has helped the good Fantaghirò, her evil powers become greatly weakened. In the fourth and fifth films, she constantly tries to get rid of Fantaghirò so she can be powerful again.