She was not even 13 when Italy joined the Second World War. She saw her home bombed by the Allies. Her father's furniture making studio lost all its stock in an air raid. The family had to flee to Rome, where they ended up living in just one room. After school she would take lessons in singing, dancing and drawing. Soon she was making a new film every month. It was a studio photograph of her and a bikini that caught the eye of Howard Hughes. He put her up for two months in a posh hotel suite,. But really kept her in a gilded cage.