I'm from Arezzo, near Florence, Tuscany (central Italy) - the city of Roberto Benigni's "Life is beautiful" - do you know?
Yeah there's differences in making pizza from north to south italy, but it's all far from the american one
At very south Italy, they tend to made it more thick and soft; at north and centre instead we tend to made it more thin and crispy. BTW at Naples (capital of pizza) they have both thin and thick type of pizza.

Mozzarella is a particular type of cheese, but it's better for pizza. On 95% of pizza you find a like-mozzarella melting cheese that is not so good like the real one.

I agree with you about french food: I was in there three times for visiting Euro Disneyland and can't find any decent food to eat