|
|
A Seasonal Program of Italian Films RSVP: SEATS WILL BE RESERVED ONLY FOR MEMBERS AND STUDENTS Is Italian cinema really dead? The America-Italy Society this year will offer to members and students an informative and stimulating series of programs showcasing Italian film, consistent with its past practice of presenting a wide range of exhibits and discussions on Italian art, music and literature. The film program at the America–Italy Society will be closely tied to the Italian language classes. Films shown as an enhancement of classroom activities provide an excellent mode of developing listening skills and exposing students to current idioms and regionalisms in the target language. The concerns expressed in films also provide topics for classroom discussions, thus stimulating speaking skills while providing an understanding of history and current cultural developments. Each presentation in Cinema All’Italiana will be preceded by a short period during which beverages and confections will be available. A presenter, or a guest speaker invited for the occasion, will then give a brief introduction to the film and provide historical, regional, or technical information to facilitate a complete viewing experience. This year we will present a series of contemporary films whose purpose is to dispute the all too common lament that Italian cinema is dead. Indeed, Italian cinema is not only alive and well, but is vigorously addressing the most vital realities in Italy today. Recently, several powerful Italian films were chosen in Cannes’ major sections, films that called upon the great traditions of the past: effective use of locations, canny insight into the political and visual techniques that confound the difference between mental and physical space. The young directors and writers in our program now have taken on the varied genres which express the current human condition. They have made as their common theme the present preoccupations, from the biting political questions raised in Nanni Moretti’s The Caiman, to the post-9/11 paranoia which pervades society in Melliti’s Io,l’altro, to the formation of new “family” ties created by our mobile youth as in Ozpetek’s Saturno contro . The nine features we are presenting will use the familiar and the startling in fresh and exciting ways to tell stories, describe portraits, articulate statements and initiate discussions. At the end of each presentation, the attendees will be invited to remain to exchange opinions, should they wish to do so. BECOME A MEMBER OR A STUDENT AND ENJOY THE “CINEMA ALL’ITALIANA” September 11, 2008 Actor, writer and director Nanni Moretti is best known in this country for his films Dear Diary and The Son’s Room, but the overwhelming bulk of his productions are the comedic political satires which have had little or no distribution in the United States. Moretti says, “Through cinema, I try to recount a reality that we are no longer able to see, to perceive. I think that our problem is one of habit: we grow to accept people and situations which, in fact, should be truly unthinkable in a democracy.” In 2002, Moretti was an organizer of a series of national protests against the Berlusconi regime and its attacks on democratic rights. Twelve months later he started work on The Caiman, a critique of then (and now again) Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. It is piece whose narrative line lampoons the contemporary art of film-making and adds a pointed political message. Bruno Bonomo (Silvio Orlando), at best a C-grade has-been, is caught in a financial melt down. At the same time he is going through the breakup of his marriage to Paola (Margherita Buy). A young director (Jasmine Trinca) hands him a script, which Bruno at first thinks is a thriller, then later discovers, to his horror, is a thinly disguised attack on the Prime Minister. The Caiman is an acerbically funny, nostalgic film about loss, both personal and political, and how both can be found deeply ingrained in Italian society of the last decades.
October 16, 2008 First time director Moshen Melliti has been concerned with social issues and the consequences of cultural differences. In today’s post 9/11 world, these differences result in a global paranoia, which affects even the most insular relationships. Giuseppe, (Raoul Bova) a young Sicilian fisherman, and Yousef Ben Ali, (Giovanni Martorana) a Tunisian émigré, have been best friends for ten years. Their lives have been hard, but their good natured comradery has helped bring them through the tough times. Recently, they have struck out on their own, and now are one payment away from owning their boat. Their former boss has been a constant hindrance, bad-mouthing Giuseppe to his friend and lowering the price paid for their catch so that the payments on the boat have become more difficult to make. Giuseppe has become increasingly stressed out over the boss’s interference. Yousef warns that he’s becoming obsessive. Giuseppe slept only two hours the night before they set sail. “Take some Xanax,” suggests the solicitous Tunisian. On their journey to the fishing grounds, Giuseppe overhears a radio report of the search for a terrorist, Yousef Ben Ali, wanted in the Madrid train bombing. The first humorous responses to the similarity of names soon erode the veneer of trust between the two men, and undisguised personal attitudes begin to emerge. The sea, object of their life long love and respect, insidiously becomes a trap in which their over-heightened emotions explode.
November 6, 2008 Ferzan Ozpetek has had as his central theme the formation of strong family ties among people who are neither related by blood, nor even by social class. His films have become an examination of how such a group copes with crises. In his previous pictures, Ignorant Fairies, Facing Windows, and Sacred Heart the protagonists come to grips with personal tragedy with the help of those with whom they have formed tight knit relationships. Such friendships, rather than family ties, carry them through upheavals and life changes. Saturn in Opposition continues Ozpetek’s inquiries into these enduring relationships. Lorenzo (Luca Argentero) and Davide (Pierfrancesco Favino) happily spend their lives together with their circle of intimates: Antonio (Stefano Accorsi) and his wife, Angelica (Margherita Buy); Roberta (Ambra Angiolini), who works for Lorenzo; acerbic Neval (Serra Yilmaz) and her young policeman husband, Roberto (Filippo Timi); Davide’s former lover, Sergio (Ennio Fantastichini); and newcomer, Paolo (Michelangelo Tommaso). They meet regularly to talk, to confide in each other, and, of course, to eat wonderful meals in Davide and Lorenzo’s kitchen. When illness strikes Lorenzo, it becomes clear that family is formed among friends and lovers, rather than in the strangling bonds that often defines kin. Ozpetek captures the feel of contemporary reality with his masterful portraits of the characters. As always, his work brings with it a desire to explore new aspects of Italian society which has made him one of the most noteworthy directors of the decade
No film screening in December
January 15, 2009 What is it that causes a young man to enter the priesthood? Is it a calling from God? Is it a desire to turn ones back on the confusing possibilities of the world and seek the Truth? Is it faith – or is it pride? “Who am I and why have I come here?” asks novitiate Andrea (Christo Zhirko) as he enters the austere Venetian seminary that becomes the start of his spiritual quest. The immense vaulted corridor of the Renaissance building houses the rooms of the monks-in-training. It soon becomes clear to the viewer, however, that the imposing corridor also reflects the conflict within Andrea. It is both his conscious and unconscious mind, at times telling of the real happenings in his life, and at times suggesting the murky workings of his interior world. Andrea becomes silently drawn to the troubled novice Fausto (Fausto Russo Alesi), who rooms next door, and the rebellious Zanna (Filipo Timi), whose sincere beliefs make Andrea’s own struggle seem feigned. Director Saverio Costanzo comments, “ Andrea’s condition is similar to my own and also that of my generation…We have followed our desires, only to end up in a limbo of never ending adolescence…I think initiation into religious life can be a metaphor for any big life choice which involves a major commitment… Anyone aspiring to solid, perfect faith must take into account his own human nature and the demons always ready to tempt one astray.”
February 19, 2009 Tonio (Claudio D’Agostino) is a twelve-year-old boy who is troubled by the increasing arguments between his parents. One day, while riding his bicycle, he is struck by a car. The driver of the car, stops, gets out, glances at him, and then leaves the scene. As he lies there in a semi-conscious state he sees a bright light, and then passes out. Later Cinzia (Stefania Casciaro), the driver, comes to the hospital to see if Tonio is all right, but flees when he recognizes her. That night, Tonio can’t sleep. As he wanders the wards, he comes upon a room where an elderly patient begins to flatline. He touches the old man’s chest, and suddenly the man revives. Was it a miracle? Did Tonio gain the power to heal when he saw the mysterious light? His father, Pietro (Carlo Bruni) explores the financial gain from his son’s experience, while his mother, Annalisa (Anna Ferruzzo), exploits the media’s interest. Tonio and Cinzia, meanwhile, are drawn together in a bond that rests on their disillusionment and hope. Director Edouardo Winspeare’s The Miracle is neither fraught with miraculous happenings, nor is it overtly religious. It is a film about the power of love and the beauty that happens every day. The Miracle is bathed in the light of southern Italy, tempered with the industrial contradictions of coastal Taranto. As Winspeare says, “…it is Puglia’s most beautiful and most wounded city. Taranto…is symbolic of the search for a lost identity.
March 12, 2009 In 1915, as the war in Europe edged closer to home, the cry of “Turkey for the Turkish” had an increasingly broad appeal, feeding the nation’s paranoia and uniting the various Fascist elements within Turkish society. The Armenians living inside the Ottoman Empire’s borders felt reasonably safe. Many of the families were successfully integrated. They were, to all intents, spared political shifts in opinion. Yet, between 1915 and 1917, more than a million Armenians were killed. In the wealthy home of Aram Avakian (Tcheky Karyo) and his wife, Armineh (Arsinee Khanjian), the advancing threat of a holocaust is ignored. They are readying their country estate for the arrival of Aram’s brother, Assadour (Mariano Rigillo). Before he arrives, however, Lark Farm becomes the scene of a horrid massacre. The men are mutilated, the male children are murdered, and the women begin their forced march into the desert where they are used as prostitutes and then left to die. Directors Paolo and Vittorio Taviani have made an unforgettable indictment of what has recently become the subject of global concern. Known for their imaginative treatment of history in such films as Padre Padrone and Chaos, the Tavianis do not spare any of the heart-wrenching details of the Armenians’ suffering. The directors bring with them their fine technical staff; Giuseppe Lanci’s remarkable cinematography, Lina Nerli Taviani’s costumes, and Andrea Chrisanti’s sets, all of which breathe life into a past which still must haunt us today.
April 16, 2009 From the Favelas in Rio to the outskirts of Marseille to the inner cities here in the United States, we are shocked and dismayed to learn of the crimes committed by the very young, crimes done with cold dispassion and no remorse. Eleven year old Rosario (Gianluca Di Gennaro) and his aging grandmother (Nuccia Fumo) live in a slum on the outskirts of Naples where his belonging to a gang is his means of survival. In the opening scene of Stolen Childhood, Rosario and his friends play a harrowing game in which they dare each other to race across a busy highway. He performs with the same indifference acts of crime and those of generosity. There is no black versus white in his universe; the street provides the law, and survival of the fittest is the only truth. Rosario’s story is told in a series of flashbacks as he rides on the metro, ostensibly to a football match. The implications of his future become clearer and clearer as we see him being groomed for the local camorra. At the same time, however, he volunteers for his friend Santino (Arturo Paglia) to help out at a local home for battered women. There he meets Caterina (Miriam Candurro) on whom he develops an ill-fated crush, for love is something that only disappoints and friendship is a lie. Stolen Childhood is not a didactic film. It tries to explain nothing. We are shown only a violated childhood and its problematic conclusions.
May 7, 2009 There is no journey more secret than that which undertakes to uncover the hidden recesses of the human mind. Perhaps that is the reason why Leo (Alessio Boni) has chosen psychoanalysis as his field, or, perhaps it is his way of keeping his own secrets carefully hidden. As children, Leo and his sister, Ale (Valeria Solarino), were witnesses to the fatal shooting of their mother, Adele (Claudia Gerini). Their father, Michele (Marco Baliani), spent 12 years in prison, and the children spent the remainder of their childhood with relatives, far from their home in Sicily, far, it was hoped, from the memories of that tragic event. Ale, however, has now met a Serbian artist who hopes to marry her. As a wedding gift, Harold (Emir Kusturica) has decided to buy her the home in which she once lived. He secretly employs Anna (Donatella Finocchiaro), a Sicilian realtor, to investigate the history of what had occurred there. Leo discovers the potential sale and is forced to visit the home and the dark and hidden memories that are shrouded only by a thin veil of forgetfulness. Director Roberto Ando and screenwriter Salvatore Marcarelli worked closely together on the script because both felt personally very connected to the theme. Ando says, “The journey of the characters in this film is, in fact, a journey in answer to the irresistible call of feelings and emotions…the indestructible, unalienable desire to rebuild…a geography of the soul, whose elements we search for all our lives.”
June 11, 2009 Vito Quaranta (Luigi Lo Cascio) is an ordinary guy with an ordinary life. He is invited to Bari by his wife’s brother, Toni Catapano (Sergio Rubini), to attend the christening of his baby. Vito is angered by the fact that he was not chosen as the child’s godfather. His anger grows into helpless rage when he discovers that his car has been stolen, and in its place, the thieves have left a large, yellow, metaphorical, lemon. Vito reports the theft to his insurance company. He quickly learns, however, that this is a big mistake in the world he has entered. His brother-in-law is astounded. One doesn’t officially tell the insurance company anything until the affair is manipulated behind the scenes. Vito is in Toni’s underworld now, a Bari governed by codes with which Toni is absolutely familiar and Vito, with his proper behavior and pure Italian is constantly being mistaken for a tourist. They set off in Toni’s flashy red sports car to search the dark streets for the missing vehicle, and Vito begins his education. He learns another way of life, a way he finds somehow seductive, somehow liberating – somehow more like Toni’s. Director Alessandro Piva, whose first work, La Capagira, has returned to Bari to create this fond homage to the great tradition of Italian comedy. My Brother-in-law/Mio cognato both recalls and updates the commedia all’italiana in a portrait of a marginal world that is the true mirror of reality.
If would like to know which movies we already displayed please consult our archive Seating will be limited. R.S.V.P.
|
