htmlentities, $_POST and Special char

[sergio_mi]

Hi,
I use htmlentities to convert special characters.
if I write

echo htmlentities('ò'); what i get is ò

but if the character cames from a form <textarea name='myText'>ò</textarea>

echo htmlentities($_POST['myText']); returns &Atilde;&sup2; // with get and request i have the same problem and obviously with any other special character

it's php 4.3.9 on apache 2.0

I hope that php installation is the right forum for this problem.

thank you.