The 1966 flood was filmed from the start - by newsreel crews, by the RAI, by amateurs with 8mm and Super 8 cameras, and within days by one of Italy's most famous directors. Much of that footage has resurfaced online over the years. These are the films most worth seeing.

Florence: Days of Destruction (1966) - Franco Zeffirelli

Franco Zeffirelli was born in Florence. On the day of the flood itself he began organizing a film to show the world what had happened and raise money for the city, enlisting his friend Furio Colombo, then the RAI's correspondent in the United States, to help write the text. Shooting and editing went on without a break, and the short documentary - known in Italian as Per Firenze - was released about a month after the disaster, with Richard Burton as narrator. It is widely reported to have raised more than $20 million for the city's recovery. Its footage, shot in the first weeks, shows the damage before the cleanup had made much headway.

For the 60th anniversary, the Fondazione Franco Zeffirelli in Piazza San Firenze is devoting an exhibition to the film, including photographs Zeffirelli took in the first hours after the flood and original documents from the production (November 4-29, 2026, free).

Restoration of Books, Florence, 1968 - Royal College of Art

A short film made by the Royal College of Art in London in 1968, while the book recovery at the National Central Library was still in progress. It shows conservators at work, including Peter Waters covering a book in leather and Christopher Clarkson making a vellum binding. It is one of the very few films of the restoration work itself rather than the flood. A digitally remastered version comes on a DVD with Sheila Waters's book Waters Rising: Letters from Florence (see Books).

Firenze Alluvione, 4 Novembre 1966 - Francesco Corsi

Amateur color footage of the flood and its aftermath, shot by Francesco Corsi. Color moving images of the flood are rare for the same reasons color photographs are, and this is some of the best that has surfaced.

The mud angels on film

The California State University mud angels. A short documentary about the inaugural class of the CSU study-abroad program in Florence, who arrived for a semester in the autumn of 1966 and spent it in the mud. More than fifty years later, the film finds them still close friends. It uses photographs from this website, taken by Joe Blaustein (see Color Photographs).

Mud Angels Recovered: FSU's First Year in Florence (2016). A 17-minute documentary by Breanna Bruner, made for the 50th anniversary, on the students and faculty of Florida State University's first study-abroad program in Florence, who arrived in 1966 and joined the volunteers at the National Library, the Accademia and the Uffizi.

Piero Bargellini. Il sindaco dell'alluvione (2026)

A documentary by Gabriele Raimondi on Piero Bargellini, the mayor who led Florence through the flood, with interviews including his children Antonina and Mauro. It will be screened in the Cenacolo of Santa Croce on October 30, 2026 at 6:30 pm (free, reservation required through the Opera di Santa Croce) and broadcast on LA7 on November 4, 2026 at 11:30 pm (in Italian).

Other footage

• Getty Images holds archival newsreel footage of Florence after the flood, including Piazza Santa Croce, viewable on its site and available for licensing.
• The 40th anniversary, 2006. Short footage (1:43) of Piazza della Signoria on the night of November 4, 2006, with the commemorative slideshow projected in the Loggia, filmed by Fuyumi Namioka.