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 It was fitting that Asia, who would go on to lead a life that could only be described as unique, would find herself immediately positioned counter to the status quo: the city's registry office refused to acknowledge ''Asia'' as an appropriate name, and instead officially inscribed her as Aria Argento.

Nevertheless, Asia retained the name that her parents had chosen for her, and embarked on a lifestyle of eccentricity and privilege that comes with growing up in the entertainment industry. For three days following her birth, her parents projected Gone with the Wind on the living room wall.

As Asia grew older, she was gradually exposed to other genres of film, notably her father's slasher movies, beginning when she was six years old with a viewing of Deep Red -- a film which, incidentally, starred her mother. It wasn't long before the Argento household was hosting horror screenings for the neighborhood kids, the popularity of which increased after the Argentos became the first owners of a Betamax player in all of Italy.

Yet any suggestions that nepotism played a role in Asia's early successes are quickly squashed by her list of awards. She received the David di Donatello (Italy's response to Hollywood's Academy Award) for Best Actress in 1994 for her performance in Perdiamoci di vista!, and again in 1996 for Compagna di viaggio, which also earned her a Grolla d'oro Award. In 1998, Asia began flaunting her talents to the West, appearing in the American movies B. Monkey and New Rose Hotel, alongside Christopher Walken.

Asia has also proven her ability to work in multiple tongues, adding French to the list of languages in which she has performed, with a role in 1994's La Reine Margot. That same year, she made her first foray into directing, calling the shots behind the short films, Prospettive and A ritroso. In 1996, she directed a documentary on her father, and in 1998 a second one on Abel Ferrara, which won her the Rome Film Festival Award. Her feature directorial debut came in 2000's Scarlet Diva, a film that she also and starred in.

While Asia is certainly a celebrity in her native country, the coverage that the Italian press showers on her is not always favorable. She has drawn criticism for her openness toward drug use and posing nude, as well as the deeply erotic scenes she has performed in, particularly those that her father has filmed.

In 2001, a great deal of attention was drawn to an alleged hit-and-run that Asia was involved in, and her position in this incident wasn't helped by the fact that a bottle of absinthe was found in her car (the liqueur was to be used as a prop in a music video that Asia was directing).

In June of 2001, Asia gave birth to her first child, Anna Lou. The father is musician Marco Castoldi (''Morgan'') from the Italian band Bluvertigo. Asia is slated to appear in two movies in 2002: the French feature La Sirene Rouge and the American action thriller, XXX, with Vin Diesel.

In addition to her accomplishments in the world of film, Asia has written a number of stories for magazines such as Dynamo and L'Espresso, while her first novel, titled I Love You Kirk, was published in Italy in 1999.