Next month's Berlin International Film Festival is set to screen a bumper crop of nine Italian films including two competition titles, Italian film promotion body Italia Cinema announced on Wednesday.

The body confirmed that Giuseppe Tornatore's coming-of-age film Malena and Ferzan Ozpetek's drama Ignorant Fairies (Fate Ignoranti) have made the official competition line-up in what it said was the largest number of Italian films at the event in ten years. Miramax is handling Malena, about a young boy's obsession with an older woman in Sicily during the Second World War; France's TF1 has Fairies about a newly widowed woman discovering that her husband had a gay lover.

Italy, which has previously complained at the lack of Italian titles at the festival, will also be represented by Wilma Labate's Domenica, Peter Del Monte's Controvento, and Rosalia Polizzi's Riconciliati, which will be shown in the Panorama section. Il Cielo Cade, a World War II feature directed by Antonio and Andrea Frazzi, will be shown in the KinderFest children's sidebar.

Elsewhere, Francesco Dal Bosco's Commesso Viaggiatore and Eros Puglielli's Tutta La Conoscenza Del Mondo will be included in the Forum, while Luciano Emmer's Una Lunga Lunga Lunga Notte D'Amore will be also be screened as a special tribute.

Berlin will also screen Rabbia, a documentary by Italian filmmaker Davide Ferrario, who has just sealed a multi-picture deal with Miramax Films.