Viola di mare (2009)

A new lesbian film, Viola di Mare (Purple Sea), is generating a lot of buzz lately, having just picked up the NICE City of Florence award last week at the San Francisco Film Society's New Italian Cinema festival. Directed by Donatella Maiorca, it is set in 19th century Sicily and revolves around Angela (Valeria Solarino) and her attraction to her best friend Sara (Isabella Ragonese). When the women start becoming a little more than friends, Angela's old fashioned father locks her away in a cellar, insisting she marry one of his male workers and wishes his daughter would have been born a boy so he wouldn't have to deal with the fact that she's gay.
This gives Angela's mother, upset about her daughter being locked up, a pretty great idea: Angela should just be trans — and become Angelo. Dad's problem solved!What's perhaps most intriguing about the film, other than its beautiful Italian stars, is that it's based on a true story, adapted from the novel Minchia di Re by Giacomo Pilati. AfterEllen.com