The Italian Film Festival UK 2007
By Richard Mowe, Director
After decades of disaffection, Italian audiences are returning to watch Italian films in numbers unseen since the glory days of Fellini and Antonioni. At one point in the year the local box office has increased by as much as 23 per cent, driven by domestic titles accounting for a significant 43 per cent of the market.
Against such a buoyant background the 14th edition of the Italian Film Festival UK in London, Manchester, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Dundee, takes pleasure in presenting its annual selection of the best in il cinema italiano including some of those hits such as Manual of Love 2, My Best Enemy with Carlo Verdone, Paolo Virzi’s Napoleon and Me and NightBefore the Exams which kick-started the stampede to the box office.
Encouragingly, though, it’s not just comedies that have been attracting attention. More substantial works by respected auteurs, such as the Turkish-bornFerzan Ozpetek with his ensemble drama Saturn in Opposition and Gianni Amelio’s Missing Star, also have fared well with audiences.
On the whole, a more pragmatic approach to production – one that’s more attuned to audience tastes and less to directorial idiosyncrasies, with ahigher premium on production values and indigenous star power such as Monica Bellucci and hot newcomer Riccardo Scamarcio – has begun to reap dividends. “Italian producers finally have found the courage and capability to speak to the public,†says Paolo Protti, president of Italy’s exhibitors’ association in one interview.
As elsewhere in Europe, Italian directors these days seem taken with revisiting their recent historical past, be it new angles on the Fascist era or the political turmoil that followed. Now the hope is that Italian films will begin to play more regularly outside their home turf, an objective that has long been encouraged by the Italian Film Festival UK.
This 2007 edition of the only event in the UK exclusively devoted to Italian cinema (from 17 November to 2 December) throws the spotlight on some of the biggest names working in Italy today among them such veterans as the Taviani Brothers, Mario Monicelli, cinematographer Vittorio Storaro, Gianni Amelio as well as Paolo Virzi, Eugenio Cappuccio, Davide Ferrario and Agostino Ferrente. Burgeoning talents include Marina Spada, Davide Marengo, and Fausto Brizzi.The healthy and vibrant documentary sector as well as a slew of short films also receives recognition and equal pride of place.
The stunning retrospective on Leading Ladies of Italian Cinema which started in September, runs on through the festival in some venues. A host of guests are waiting in the wings ready to journey with their films – watchthe website for confirmed details.
Among the invitees are the brothers Vittorio and Paolo Taviani who have become legendary figures in the international reputation of Italian cinema. Films like Allonsanfan (1974), Cannes Palme d'Or winner Padre, Padrone (1977) and La Notte di San Lorenzo (1982) have combined an eye-catching beauty with a heartfelt evocation of rural life and the struggles of working people. Now in their late 70s, the brothers have returned to the limelight with The Lark Farm, an adaptation of the Antonia Arslan novel that seems set to become the most controversial film of their careers.
A dark, sweeping melodrama, The Lark Farm followsin the wake of Elia Kazan's America, America (1963) and Atom Egoyan's Ararat (2002) as one of the rare films that dares to address Turkey's 1915 genocide against the Armenians in which close to one million lives are believed to have been lost. It remains the most sensitive and taboo of subjects as Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk has found to his cost. The furore when the Nobel laureate wrote about the genocide ultimately forced him into exile.
The Taviani brothers have never shied away from difficult subjects; La notte di San Lorenzo was a bravura evocation of Tuscan resistance to Nazi aggression. Their belief in the power of the people and the evils of oppression has been a constant factor in their careers and The Lark Farm is merely a continuation of that.
The Panorama section of the festival also includes another veteran Mario Monicelli as well as the more recent generations of Carlo Verdone, Gianni Amelio, Paolo Virzi, Eugenio Cappuccio, and Ferzan Ozpetek. They turn their attention to topics as varied as the creative turmoil of an artist, wartime comedy, genocide in Armenia, and assorted contemporary love tangles as well as a romance across the cultural divide. There are knock-out performances on view from the likes of Michele Placido, Monica Bellucci, Carlo Verdone, Riccardo Scamarcio, Silvio Muccino, Sergio Castellitto, Stefano Accorsi and Margherita Buy.
The most exciting new talents in Italian cinema who have been making their mark in film festivals around the globe. Names to watch in Nuovo Cinema include Marina Spada with a stylish second feature; Fausto Brizzi and his bright and br eezy youthful hit comedy; Davide Marengo and a film noir romp; Gian Paolo Cugno with a seductive heart-warming tale and Giuseppe Gagliardi’s fabulous mockumentary on real-life singer Tony Vilar.
There is no such thing as an overnight success in the Italian film industry. The writer and director Marina Spada may seem like a new star after the international acclaim for her second feature Come l’ombra (As The Shadow) but her breakthrough comes after more than 20 years of wide-ranging work in film, television and advertising.
Spada’s career began in the best of company as an assistant director on the classic comedy Non ci resta che piangere (Nothing Left To Do But Cry, 1985) co-starring Roberto Benigni and Massimo Troisi. She later taught at the Milan Film School and made a number of acclaimed video portraits of Fernanda Pivano, Francesco Leonetti and Gabriele Basilico among many others. Interest in her career began to build after a number of striking short films and her feature debut Forza Cani (2002) but it is Come l’ombra that has catapulted her into a different league.
In the year of the 200th anniversary of Giuseppe Garibaldi's birth, the Istituto Italiano di Cultura in Edinburgh and London have organised a series of events to celebrate one of the most internationally known Italian heroes from Risorgimento. As part of the celebrations the Italian Film Festival has secured a rare screening of the film 1860 (1934) by Alessandro Blasetti, which will introduced in Edinburgh by Pasquale Iannone (Edinburgh University) and in Glasgow by Philip Cooke (Strathclyde University).
The programme also finds a place dedicated to Italian documentaries, demonstrating the process of renewal and rebirth of a “genre†that traditionally has been neglected in Italy, overlooked by cinema distribution and television programming. Now many famous fiction directors are trying their hand at documentaries, including Davide Ferrario, Carlo Mazzacurati and Guido Chiesa. This year’s crop is auspicious with the
runaway success of The Orchestra of the Piazzo Vittorio, a hard-hitting look at the Sicilian Mafia, and a special focus on women.
Short films have a language, timing and rhythm that are all their own and they have not been neglected. Curated by leading film specialist Vanessa Strizzi (director of the Umbria Film Festival held every July in Montone) the selection is always vibrant, eclectic and wide-ranging in its scope and ambition. Some shorts will be screened with features while London audiences at the Riverside Studios in Hammersmith will be able to sample a complete shorts programme.
THE COMPLETE PROGRAMME AT A GLANCE
PANORAMA
Caravaggio (18)
Desert Roses / Le rose del deserto (15)
The Lark Farm / La masseria delle allodole (15)
Manual of Love 2 / Manuale d’amore 2 (15)
My Best Enemy / Il mio miglior nemico (15)
The Missing Star / La stella che non c’è (12A)
Napoleon and Me / Io e Napoleone (12A)
One Out of Two / Uno su due (15)
Saturn in Opposition / Saturno contro (15)
NUOVO CINEMA
As The Shadow / Come l’ombra (15)
Night Before the Exams
Notte prima degli esami (12A)
Night Bus/Notturno bus (12A)
Salvatore – This Is Life /
Salvatore – Questa è la vita (PG)
True Legend of Tony Vilar
La vera leggenda di Tony Vilar (12)
THE GARIBALDI ANNIVERSARY
1860 (12)
LA VITA – FOR REAL
Excellent Cadavers / In un altro paese (18)
Orchestra Of Piazza Vittorio
L’Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio (12)
Primo Levi's Journey / La Strada di Levi (15)
Simply Beautiful / Bellissime (12)
WHERE AND WHEN
Edinburgh Filmhouse Sat 17 – Thurs 29 Nov 88 Lothian Road, Edinburgh EH3 9BZ
Glasgow GFT Fri 16 – Thurs 29 Nov 12 Rose Street, Glasgow G3 6RB
Dundee DCA Fri 23 – Thurs 29 Nov 152 Nethergate, Dundee DD1 4DY
Chapter Arts Centre Fri 29 – Sun 3 Dec
Market Road Canton Cardiff South Glamorgan CF5 1QE UK
London Riverside Studios Fri 16 – Sun 25 Nov Crisp Road, Hammersmith, London W6 9RL
Renoir Cinema Fri 23 – Tues 27 Nov Brunswick Shopping Centre London WC1N 1AW
Cornerhouse Fri 16 – Wed 21 Nov 70 Oxford Street, Manchester M1 5NH
