Monday, May 12, 2014
Preview: OPEN ROADS: NEW ITALIAN CINEMA 2014
THE FILM SOCIETY OF LINCOLN CENTER
OPEN ROADS: NEW ITALIAN CINEMA
JUNE 5-12
HIGHLIGHTS INCLUDE
OPENING NIGHT SELECTION OF DANIELE LUCHETTI’S
THOSE HAPPY YEARS
VENICE FILM FESTIVAL PRIZEWINNER GIANFRANCO ROSI’S SACRO GRA
ROME FILM FESTIVAL PRIZEWINNER ALBERTO FASULO’S
TIR
IN-PERSON APPEARANCES BY
DIRECTORS
DANIELE LUCHETTI, ROBERTO ANDÒ,
PIERFRANCESCO DILIBERTO,
ALBERTO FASULO, GIANFRANCO ROSI,
ALESSANDRO ROSSETTO,
GIOVANNA VERONESI, EDOARDO WINSPEARE
ACTRESS
VALERIA SOLARINO
Open Roads: New Italian Cinema, will take place from June 5-12, 2014. Open Roads has served as the leading North American showcase of contemporary Italian cinema for the past 13 years. This edition includes the latest work from established veterans (Gianni Amelio, Roberto Andò, Daniele Luchetti) and top award winners, alongside promising new talents from both the commercial and independent spheres, with in-person appearances at many screenings.
Making I CAN QUIT WHENEVER I WANT
OPEN ROADS: NEW ITALIAN CINEMA 2014
FILM SOCIETY OF LINCOLN CENTER
This year’s festival highlights the emergence of exciting works by many documentarians, and explores hybrid combinations of documentaries and fiction, with more than a third of the films focused on the medium with rich and fascinating results. Top prizewinners include Gianfranco Rosi’s Sacro GRA, the first documentary to win the Golden Lion for Best Film at the Venice Film Festival, which explores Rome’s 43.5-mile highway, Grande Raccordo Anulare, that encircles the city by focusing on absorbing, moving individual portraits that emerge from the areas drivers pass through but never see, to reveal a different side of the bustling city’s inhabitants.
Alberto Fasulo’s docudrama debut Tir won the top prize at the Rome Film Festival and follows a former teacher from Bosnia who takes a job driving a tractor trailer (“tir”) through Europe. Combining professional actors and real truck drivers, Fasulo has created a striking film about what life is really like on the road — a film that that simulates a documentary.
Other documentaries include Vincenzo Marra’s Naples-set The Administrator, which looks at a building administrator’s dealings with his larger-than-life tenants, providing a tough-minded yet affectionate portrait of an Italy mired in crisis. Gianni Amelio’s Happy to Be Different is a moving, enlightening work of oral history of gay life in Italy from the fall of Fascism through the early 1980s.
Several films in this year’s lineup explore the evolution of Italy’s political transformation. including the opening-night selection, Daniele Luchetti’s Those Happy Years, a charming, coming-of-age autobiographical tale of the director’s childhood as a budding filmmaker growing up in Rome in the 1970s during a radical, transformative period in Italy. Giovanni Veronesi’s The Fifth Wheel is a humorous tale that takes audiences on a journey of a half-century of pivotal political events through the eyes of actor and screenwriter Ernesto Fioretti.
Politics and social issues facing Italians also play a role in Gianni Amelio’s A Lonely Hero, starring comedian and actor Antonio Albanese, whose character learns to reinvent and adapt himself to any job as a professional substitute (train conductor, fishmonger, tailor, etc.), as a result of the country’s unstable unemployment crisis. Roberto Andò’s Long Live Freedom is a scathing critique of Italian political dynamics and stars Toni Servillo as a seasoned politician navigating the decline of his party by fleeing to Paris and hiding out at the home of his ex-girlfriend. Renowned TV host and political comedian Pierfrancesco Diliberto wrote, directed, and stars in The Mafia Only Kills in Summer, his feature debut about a young boy and his obsession with the Mafia’s presence in his city… and a beautiful schoolmate who remains his love interest until adulthood. The love story is set against a backdrop of some of Italy’s most tragic past criminal events. Edoardo Winspeare’s Quiet Bliss follows three generations of women who seek refuge in their family’s olive grove after their small textile business collapses and their efforts to revive their lives in the wake of economic catastrophe and the recession.
Single screening tickets are $13; $9 for students and seniors (62+); and $8 for Film Society members. See more and play less with a discount package starting at $30; $24 for students and seniors (62+); and $21 for Film Society members. The discount package prices apply with the purchase of tickets to three films or more. Visit FilmLinc.com for more information.
All screenings will be held at the Film Society of Lincoln Center's Walter Reade Theater, at 165 West 65th Street, between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue. Additional information on the series can be found at:
Screening Venue:
The Film Society of Lincoln Center
Walter Reade Theater, 165 West 65th Street, between Broadway and Amsterdam
FILMS, DESCRIPTIONS & SCHEDULE
Opening Night
U.S. Premiere
Those Happy Years (Anni felici)
Daniele Luchetti, Italy, 2013, DCP, 100m
Italian with English subtitles
Luchetti’s warm-hearted, bittersweet autobiographical account of his childhood as a budding filmmaker growing up in Rome in the ’70s stars Kim Rossi Stuart and Micaela Ramazotti as unconventional parents caught up in turbulent times. He’s an avant-garde artist and she’s wrestling with gender roles as she discovers feminism and free love. Luchetti (My Brother Is an Only Child) brilliantly re-creates the atmosphere of urgency and rapid change surrounding the family. He also poignantly conveys his own coming-of-age perspective, that of a boy grappling with radical transformations inside his family and on the street, capturing it all with his brand-new Super-8 camera.
Thursday, June 5, 1:00pm (Q&A with Daniele Luchetti)
Thursday, June 5, 6:30pm (Q&A with Daniele Luchetti)
U.S. Premiere
The Administrator (L’amministratore)
Vincenzo Marra, Italy, 2013, 83m
Italian with English subtitles
In the lively and absorbing fifth installment in a series of docs celebrating his native Naples, Marra turns a spotlight on the life of Umberto Montella, a building administrator whose job seems to demand skills in management as much as in therapy. An effortless arbiter of the passionate conflicts that arise among tenants, the Quixotic Montella leads us in and out of the homes of his larger-than-life clients, rich and poor Neapolitans whose lives illuminate the city’s volatile moods. Sometimes funny and always poignant, these profoundly human stories flow in and out of one another following a natural rhythm. However specific the tales, characters, and places, the immersion into these entangled lives is also a tough-minded yet affectionate look at an Italy mired in crisis.
Monday, June 9, 6:30pm
Tuesday, June 10, 1:30pm
U.S. Premiere
The Fifth Wheel (L’ultima ruota del carro)
Giovanni Veronesi, Italy, 2013, DCP, 113m
Italian with English subtitles
Veronesi’s irresistible romantic comedy takes a journey through pivotal events in four decades of recent Italian history, as seen through the lens of Ernesto Fioretti’s unexceptional life. Played with charm and a disarming sense of humor by Elio Germano, Ernesto is a good-hearted, honest middle-class guy who struggles to keep up with changes and is always a step behind. His father disparaged Ernesto by likening him to the “fifth wheel of the wagon,” and his aspirations and involvement through the rise and fall of Socialism and the Berlusconi era are accordingly modest. But his protagonist’s apparent simplicity is precisely one of the strengths of this Tuscan director’s fifteenth feature, which opened the Rome Film Festival last year to great acclaim. Rich in emotions, its ups and downs coinciding with those of the country, Ernesto’s life serves as the perfect platform for abundant laughter and tears.
Friday, June 6, 6:30pm (Q&A with Giovanni Veronesi)
Wednesday, June 11, 1:00pm (Q&A with Giovanni Veronesi)
Happy to Be Different (Felice chi è diverso)
Gianni Amelio, Italy, 2014, 93m
In Italian with English subtitles
A moving and enlightening work of oral history, Gianni Amelio’s new documentary is a chronicle of gay life in Italy from the fall of Fascism through the early 1980s. Amelio combines interviews with a wide range of older gay Italian men (including Pasolini muse Ninetto Davoli), newsreel footage, and clips from “educational” films warning against homosexuality, and in the process reveals a profound gap between the subjects’ firsthand experiences and the Italian media’s representations of them. The resulting film is a deeply personal account of the advent of gay culture amid the ruins of Mussolini’s Italy and the eternally poignant story of how persecuted individuals developed pragmatic ways to attain everyday happiness.
Tuesday, June 10, 9:00pm
Wednesday, June 11, 4:00pm
U.S. Premiere
The Human Factor (La variabile umana)
Bruno Oliviero, Italy, 2013, DCP, 82m
Italian with English subtitles
Matters get very complicated for chief inspector Monaco (Silvio Orlando) after the murder of a high-profile member of Milan’s seedy nightlife. He is a widower with a teenage daughter, and, one night, all his neglected personal issues seem to catch up with him, forcing him out of the slump he’s been in since the death of his wife. Rendered darkly beautiful as a noir setting, Milan is the electric backdrop for this detective story that delves as much into the intimate life of one man and his daughter as into this elegant city’s underworlds. In his fiction debut, Olivierio’s extensive documentary experience is palpable in his portrait of Milan—a character in itself—as well as in the vivid and telling details with which he characterize its inhabitants.
Thursday, June 5, 4:00pm
Friday, June 6, 9:30pm
U.S. Premiere
I Can Quit Whenever I Want (Smetto quando voglio)
Sydney Sibilia, Italy, 2014, 100m
Italian with English subtitles
A band of brilliant unemployed and underemployed academics—two Latinists, a chemist, a neurobiologist, an anthropologist, and an economist—turn to a life of crime in order to survive. Deftly assimilating such influences as Breaking Bad and Trainspotting, this biting parody on the plight of the Italian middle class in the aftermath of the economic crisis boasts a fast pace, witty dialogue, and a terrific cast. A debut to watch from Salerno-native Sibilia, the film was a resounding commercial and critical hit when released in Italy earlier this year.
Friday, June 6, 3:30pm (Q&A with actress Valeria Solarino)
Sunday, June 8, 9:00pm (Q&A with actress Valeria Solarino)
U.S. Premiere
A Lonely Hero (L'intrepido)
Gianni Amelio, Italy, 2013, DCP, 104m
Italian with English Subtitles
Amelio follows his 2011 Camus adaptation, The First Man, with a deadpan parable about a small everyday hero from Milan who contends with the unemployment crisis in a very particular way: he’s a “professional” substitute worker, skilled and knowledgeable enough to replace anyone in any job. True to his name, Antonio Pane is as good and essential as bread. Whether working as a train conductor, fishmonger, tailor, street sweeper, or bricklayer, he approaches the country’s instability with a deep moral consistency as he reinvents himself everyday. Amelio wrote this film especially for actor Antonio Albanese, who personifies the film’s dark humor and underlying sense of hope. An Emerging Pictures release.
Monday, June 5, 9:15pm
Tuesday, June 10, 6:30pm
U.S. Premiere
Long Live Freedom (Viva la libertà)
Roberto Andò, Italy, 2013, DCP, 93m
Italian with English Subtitles
Enrico Oliveri (a brilliant Toni Servillo) is a seasoned center-left politician and president of the opposition who realizes that the decline of his party is inevitable. As the polls announce he will lose dramatically in the upcoming elections, he falls into a profound existential crisis and disappears. We later learn that he has fled to Paris and is hiding out at the home of his ex-girlfriend Danielle (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi). While his colleagues panic, his top aide (Valerio Mastandrea) discovers that Enrico has a twin brother living in a psychiatric institution. What at first seems like a crazy plan soon proves to be their only solution. A scathing critique of Italian political dynamics, Andò’s film is also a pulsating thriller with great comic moments that brings together some of the most talented actors working in Italy today.
Friday, June 6, 1:00pm (Q&A with Roberto Andò)
Saturday, June 7, 9:00pm (Q&A with Roberto Andò)
U.S. Premiere
The Mafia Only Kills in Summer (La mafia uccide solo d’estate)
Pierfrancesco Diliberto, Italy, 2013, DCP, 89m
Italian with English subtitles
Pierfrancesco Diliberto (a renowned TV host and political comedian, better known as Pif) wrote, directed, and stars in this subversive, irreverent feature debut about Arturo, a young boy whose obsession with the Mafia’s casual presence in his city surpasses even his passion for Flora, the beautiful schoolmate who remains his main love interest until adulthood. Pif uses Arturo’s unrequited love story as the vehicle to narrate the most tragic events in Italy’s recent history, starting with the Cosa Nostra’s criminal actions in Sicily in the ’70s, which soon spread through the country (encompassing the barbaric murder of judges Falcone and Borsellino, an event that Pif handles with astounding boldness). Winner of the Audience Award at the Torino Film Festival, Mafia is a brave and intelligent dark comedy with a powerful message.
Saturday, June 7, 3:30pm (Q&A with Pierfrancesco Diliberto aka Pif)
Thursday, June 12, 4:00pm (Q&A with Pierfrancesco Diliberto aka Pif)
Quiet Bliss (In grazia di Dio)
Edoardo Winspeare, Italy, 2014, 127m
In Italian with English subtitles
Three generations of women seek refuge in their family’s Salento olive grove after their small textile business collapses in Winspeare’s warm and vibrant drama. Against the backdrop of a radiant southern Italian landscape, Winspeare’s characters—serene Salvatrice (Anna Boccadamo), hardened Adele (Celeste Casciaro), loudmouthed Ina (Laura Licchetta), and aspiring thespian Maria Conchetta (Barbara De Matteis)—revive their lives in the wake of economic catastrophe. Turning to a back-to-basics existence as a means of healing the wounds wrought by the recession, they undergo transformations that the director renders with equal parts pathos, insight, and humor.
Saturday, June 7, 6:00pm (Q&A with Edoardo Winspeare)
Monday, June 9, 1:00pm (Q&A with Edoardo Winspeare)
U.S. Premiere
The Referee (L’arbitro)
Paolo Zucca, Italy/Argentina, 2013, 96m
Italian with English subtitles
Sardinian third-league soccer team Atletico Pabarile is suddenly winning every match of the season, after years of losing consistently to Montecrastu, the team led by cocky and abusive landowner Brai. The return of soccer wizard Matzutzi from a sojourn in Argentina has turned the team of farmers into unexpected champions—and now it feels like anything is possible. Enter Cruciani (a great Stefano Accorsi), a young referee greedily climbing his way to the top, and two cousins playing for Montecrastu who are involved in an escalating conflict about archaic sheep-breeding codes in Sardinia. These disparate plots come together explosively in the lush black-and-white world of Zucca’s slyly funny and utterly distinctive first feature.
Tuesday, June 10, 4:00pm
Wednesday, June 11, 9:00pm
U.S. Premiere
Sacro GRA
Gianfranco Rosi, Italy/France, 2013, DCP, 93m
Italian with English subtitles
The first documentary to win the Golden Lion for Best Film at the Venice Film Festival, the latest from Gianfranco Rosi (El Sicario, Room 164 and Below Sea Level), reveals the sheer diversity of life bubbling around the margins of Rome’s Grande Raccordo Anulare, the 43.5-mile highway that encircles the city, the longest in all of Italy. The absorbing and often moving individual portraits that emerge—an ambulance driver caring for his ailing mother, a scientist studying palm trees ravaged by beetles, an eel fisherman nostalgic for old traditions—give visibility and a human face to the places Sacro GRA drivers pass through but never see, while exposing the city’s striking contradictions. Inspired in part by Italo Calvino’s novel Invisible Cities, Rosi’s captivating chorale plunges the viewer into this paradoxical reality, allowing us a more direct, even sensorial experience of life in the shadow of progress.
Sunday, June 8, 6:30pm Q&A with Gianfranco Rosi)
Monday, June 9, 4:00pm (Q&A with Gianfranco Rosi)
U.S. Premiere
Small Homeland (Piccola Patria)
Alessandro Rossetto, Italy, 2013, DCP, 111m
Italian with English subtitles
Best friends Luisa and Renata long above all else to leave their stifling provincial town in northeastern Italy, where tensions between locals and immigrants are forever threatening to boil over. They work as maids in a hotel but supplement their income with sexual trysts, sometimes assisted by Luisa’s Albanian boyfriend, and hatch a blackmail scheme that fails to play out as expected. The rhythms of daily life in this border zone—where city meets countryside—are captured in vivid detail in the highly promising fiction debut by Rossetto, an experienced documentarian working mainly with nonprofessional actors.
Sunday, June 8, 3:30pm (Q&A with Alessandro Rossetto)
Thursday, June 12, 8:45pm
U.S. Premiere
South Is Nothing (Il Sud e niente)
Fabio Mollo, Italy, 2013, DCP, 86m
Italian with English subtitles
Grazia was 12 years old when she was told by her widower father that her beloved older brother Pietro had died, and never spoken a word since. Now a tomboyish 18, after one of her regular arguments with her father, Grazia flees to the seaside and into the water, where she has an otherworldly experience and thinks she sees her brother. Thus begins her quest to discover another truth, not only about her lost sibling but also about herself. This poised and striking debut by the young Mollo, who shot this film in the Reggio Calabria village where he grew up, features a remarkable central performance by the young Miriam Karlkvist.
Sunday, June 8, 1:00pm
Monday, June 9, 9:00pm
ALBA ROHRWACHER
Above: visiting HIFF in 2009 as a "Rising Star"
Alba appears in A STREET IN PALERMO
Photo by Eric Roffman
U.S. Premiere
A Street in Palermo (Via Castellana Bandiera)
Emma Dante, Italy, 2013, DCP, 92m
Italian with English subtitles
Based on her own novel, Emma Dante’s first feature is set in Palermo and shot almost entirely in a narrow alleyway in a run-down neighborhood. On a hot Sunday afternoon, three women are caught in what turns out to be a tragic confrontation. Rosa (Dante) and her partner, Clara (Alba Rohrwacher), have just driven in from Milan and are on their way to a friend’s wedding. As they turn onto Via Castellana Bandiera, they find the Calafiore family jammed into a car driven by Samira (Elena Cotta), a mule-headed Sicilian of Albanian descent. Both drivers stubbornly refuse to back up, as tensions escalate and the neighborhood looks on. An accomplished theater director, Dante includes some knowing nods to spaghetti Westerns and genre conventions in her ambitious film debut, and coaxes formidable performances from her skilled cast (Cotta won the Best Actress Award at the Venice Film Festival).
Wednesday, June 11, 6:30pm
Thursday, June 12, 1:30pm
U.S. Premiere
Tir
Alberto Fasulo, Italy/Croatia, 2013, 83m
Italian with English Subtitles
The first Italian film to win the top prize at the Rome Film Festival, Fasulo’s striking fiction debut follows Branko (played by Branko Zavrsan, from the Oscar-winning No Man’s Land), a former teacher from Bosnia who takes a job driving a tractor trailer (“tir”) through Europe. A native of Friuli with a documentary background, Fasulo immerses the viewer in the experience of the trucker on the road—the sounds, the landscape, and the longing for company (Branko’s phone conversations with his wife are particularly poignant). Part of a growing movement of Italian filmmakers exploring hybrid combinations of documentary and fiction, Fasulo uses both professional actors and real truck drivers, and his approach yields both an intimate connection to his characters and an evocative sense of place.
Saturday, June 7, 1:00pm
Thursday, June 12, 6:30pm (Q&A with Alberto Fasulo)
Public Screening Schedule
Screening Venues:
The Film Society of Lincoln Center
Walter Reade Theater, 165 West 65th Street, between Broadway and Amsterdam
Thursday, June 5
1:00PM Those Happy Years (100m)
4:00PM The Human Factor (82m)
6:30PM Those Happy Years (100m)
9:15PM A Lonely Hero (104m)
Friday, June 6
1:00PM Long Live Freedom (93m)
3:30PM I Can Quit Whenever I Want (100m)
6:30PM The Fifth Wheel (113m)
9:30PM The Human Factor (82m)
Saturday, June 7
1:00PM Tir (83m)
3:30PM The Mafia Only Kills in Summer (89m)
6:00PM Quiet Bliss (127m)
9:00PM Long Live Freedom (93m)
Sunday, June 8
1:00PM South Is Nothing (86m)
3:30PM Small Homeland (111m)
6:30PM Sacro GRA (93m)
9:00PM I Can Quit Whenever I Want (100m)
Monday, June 9
1:00PM Quiet Bliss (127m)
4:00PM Sacro GRA (93m)
6:30PM The Administrator (83m)
9:00PM South Is Nothing (86m)
Tuesday, June 10
1:30PM The Administrator (83m)
4:00PM The Referee (96m)
6:30PM A Lonely Hero (104m)
9:00PM Happy to Be Different (93m)
Wednesday, June 11
1:00PM The Fifth Wheel (113m)
4:00PM Happy to Be Different (93m)
6:30PM A Street in Palermo (92m)
9:00PM The Referee (96m)
Thursday, June 12
1:30PM A Street in Palermo (92m)
4:00PM The Mafia Only Kills in Summer (89m)
6:30PM Tir (83m)
8:45PM Small Homeland (111m)
Labels: Alba Rohrwacher, ALBERTO FASULO, ALESSANDRO ROSSETTO, DANIELE LUCHETTI, GIANFRANCO ROSI, GIOVANNA VERONESI, Open Roads: New Italian Cinema, The Film Society of Lincoln Center, VALERIA SOLARINO
Saturday, June 09, 2012
OPEN ROADS: NEW ITALIAN CINEMA 2012
THE FILM SOCIETY OF LINCOLN CENTER
OPEN ROADS: NEW ITALIAN CINEMA 2012
June 8 to June 14
THE ARRIVAL OF WANG
Photo Courtesy of Open Roads & The Film Society of Lincoln Center
MAGNIFICENT PRESENCE
Photo Courtesy of Open Roads & The Film Society of Lincoln Center
Open Roads: New Italian Cinema will take place from June 8-14. This year’s lineup includes debuts, a return of favorite filmmakers as well as several award winners including TERRAFERMA, Special Jury Prize winner at the 2011 Venice Film Festival and Là-bas: A Criminal Education, Winner of “Lion of the Future” award at the 2011 Venice Film Festival.
A diverse selection of titles also includes comedies such as STEP INTO PARADISE, ESCORT IN LOVE and the return of genre cinema with THE LEGEND OF KASPAR HAUSER starring Vincent Gallo and THE ARRIVAL OF WANG. The 2012 lineup expertly showcases the fact that today’s young Italian filmmakers are embracing classic storytelling and breathing new life into them.
The series will feature directorial debuts by two of Italy’s finest screenwriters, Francesco Bruni whose debut EASY! was voted best film in the “Controcampo Italiano” section of last year’s Venice Film Festival and Ivan Cotroneo’s comedic turn in the director’s chair with KRYPTONITE. Other debuts include filmmaker Pippo Mezzapesa’s ANNALISA and the debut feature by the De Serio brothers, Gianluca and Massimliano, titled SEVEN ACTS OF MERCY and features astonishing performances by lead veteran actor Robert Herlitzka and newcomer Olimpia Melinte.
Such masters as Ermanno Olmi will return this year with THE CARDBOARD VILLAGE, a striking parable about the defense of faith in a world posed to deny it; the new film by Ferzan Ozpetek, MAGNIFICENT PRESENCE, inspired by Antonio Pietrangeli’s Ghosts of Rome and has been brilliantly updated; and one of Italy’s most popular contemporary filmmakers Carlo Verdone, who has returned to the screen with a kind of Odd Couple for the new millennium titled STEP INTO PARADISE.
Another highlight this year includes winner of Best Documentary at the 2011 Golden Globe awards in Italy, Gianfranco Giagni’s film Dante Ferretti: Italian Production Designer. A tribute to one of the greatest artists working today, winner of three Oscars (most recently for the extraordinary look of Hugo) and a key, longtime collaborator of directors ranging from Fellini and Pasolini to Terry Gilliam, Tim Burton and Martin Scorsese.
Open Roads: New Italian Cinema has been organized by The Film Society of Lincoln Center together with Istituto Luce-Cinecittà - Filmitalia and the support of Ministero per i Beni e le Attivitá Culturali (Direzione Generale per il Cinema) in collaboration with the Italian Cultural Institute of New York. Special thanks to the Alexander Bodini Foundation, Casa Italiana Zerilli-Marimó and Antonio Monda for their generous support.
Take advantage of a special Three Film Package! Buy 1 ticket to 3 different films, and save. Pricing structure for this is - $30 General Public/ $24 Students & Seniors/ $21 Members.
Tickets can be purchased at both the box office and on www.Filmlinc.com .
Prices: $13 General Public/ $9 Students & Seniors/ $8 Members.
All screenings will be held at the Film Society of Lincoln Center's Walter Reade Theater, located at 165 West 65th Street, between Amsterdam Avenue and Broadway.
Additional information on the series can be found at: http://filmlinc.com/openroads .
FILMS, DESCRIPTIONS & SCHEDULE
Annalisa/Il paese delle spose infelici
Pippo Mezzapesa, 2011, Italy; 82m
Another standout in a year of several impressive Italian feature film debuts, Annalisa follows the exploits of two young men from Apulia who, judging from their own parents’ lives, don’t seem to have too many auspicious prospects. Veleno is new in town, but manages to strike up a friendship with Zaza, a charismatic, talented soccer player who dreams of playing for Juventus. One day a bit of excitement comes to town: the secretive, somewhat eccentric Annalisa climbs to the roof of the local church and threatens to jump off. Annalisa goes on to form an emotional ménage à trois with Veleno and Zaza, who learn the source of her despair and vow to protect her from it. Mezzapesa brilliantly captures the rhythm of teenage time: events occur unpredictably, haphazardly, with great attention paid to providing the texture and atmosphere of these young lives. The three leads—Nicolas Orzella, Luca Schipani and Aylin Prandi—are uniformly terrific. Director Pippo Mezzapesa in-person!
*WED, JUN 13, 8:15PM
THE ARRIVAL OF WANG
Directors Antonio and Marco Manetti
Photo by Eric Roffman - QPORIT
The Arrival of Wang/L'arrivo di Wang
Antonio & Marco Manetti, 2011, Italy; 80m
A respected Chinese interpreter, Gaia, receives an intriguing if somewhat mysterious phone call from an old client: they need her services as soon as possible, although they can’t say much about the job for which they’re hiring her. Led blindfolded to a secret location, she’s put into darkened room where a soft voice at the other end of a long table says in perfect Chinese, “I am Wang.” But who is Wang, and why are the authorities taking such pains to keep him under wraps? A new generation of Italian filmmakers is rediscovering the pleasures and possibilities of genre filmmaking, and The Arrival of Wang is a proud representative of this trend. The dialog is razor-sharp, and the action moves briskly; just as we become certain that we understand what’s truly happening, brother directors Antonio and Marco Manetti come along and pull the rug out from under our feet, sending us back to square one. With Ennio Fantastichini and Francesca Cuttica. Directors Antonio & Marco Manetti in person at June 10 screening!
*SUN. JUN 10, 7:50PM; WED. JUN 13, 4:15PM
The Cardboard Village/Il villaggio di cartone
Ermanno Olmi, 2011, Italy; 87m
One of the genuine masters of the Italian cinema, Ermanno Olmi (The Tree of Wooden Clogs) returns with this striking parable about the defense of faith in a world posed to deny it. An old church is scheduled for demolition: the paintings have been taken off the walls, the sacred objects put away, and a giant, mechanical arm starts to take down the life-size crucifix that hangs over the altar. Yet, despite seeing the destruction of a place in which he has devoted so much of his life, the old priest (Michael Lonsdale, in a beautiful performance) feels a certain joy, for stripped of all its decorations the building has returned to its true nature as a meeting place for humanity and the Divine, where the poor and the desperate can find a haven. As so often in his work, Olmi—who recently celebrated his 80th birthday—starts with a philosophical or spiritual themes and then fashions a story that gives these themes a powerful, very contemporary relevance.
*FRI. JUN 8, 4PM; TUES. JUN 12, 8:50PM
Dante Ferretti: Italian Production Designer/Dante Ferretti: Scenografo italiano
Gianfranco Giagni, 2010, Italy; 52m
A loving, insightful tribute to one of the greatest artists working in cinema today: Dante Ferretti, winner of three Oscars (most recently for the extraordinary look of Hugo) and a key, longtime collaborator of directors ranging from Fellini and Pasolini to Terry Gilliam, Tim Burton and Martin Scorsese. Ferretti discusses his art, taking us to those places that have inspired his designs as well as sharing and explains his sketches and models. Those interviewed for the film include Leonardo DiCaprio, Terry Gilliam, Giuseppe Tornatore and Martin Scorsese. A valuable introduction to the little-heralded area of production design so crucial for the impact of a film, Dante Ferretti: Italian Production Designer was awarded Best Documentary at the 2011 Golden Globe awards in Italy. Dante Ferretti in person!
*SAT. JUN 9, 5:30PM
Diaz: Don’t Clean Up This Blood
Daniele Vicari, 2012, Italy/Romania/France; 127m
Daniele Vicari’s searing rendition of the events surrounding the horrifying and still controversial police raid at the Diaz Pascoli School in Genoa during the 2001 G8 Summit was one of the most hotly debated films at this year’s Berlin Film Festival. The summit was drawing to an end; although there had been numerous clashes between the police and the many protesters who had descended upon the city, things had been calm for hours. Around midnight, dozens of uniformed police officers arrived at Diaz, a temporary shelter for the many international protesters, as well as a site for various social forums. For the next two hours, the police moved down its hallways, indiscriminately attacking everyone they could find, sending dozens off to the hospital or a detention center. Described as the greatest European human rights tragedy since World War II, the events at Diaz continue to fester in Italian politics—a terrible wound that still has not been healed.
*FRI. JUN 8, 9PM
Easy!/Scialla!
Francesco Bruni, 2011, Italy; 95m
Voted best film in the “Controcampo Italiano” section of last year’s Venice Film Festival, Easy is the terrific directorial debut by one of Italy’s finest screenwriters, Francesco Bruni (Caterina in the City, The First Beautiful Thing). Fabrizio Bentivoglio is wonderful as Bruno, a formerly talented writer who now ghostwrites celebrity autobiographies. To make ends meet, he also gives boring, listless private lessons to bored, listless students, one of whom, Luca, is on the verge of being expelled. One day, Luca’s mother comes to see Bruno and reveals that Luca is actually his son, born of a tryst when she was a student and Bruno was a schoolteacher. Moreover, she informs Bruno it’s time for him to do some parenting. By turns hilarious and heartbreaking, Easy chronicles one man’s unusual path to growing up. Director Francesco Bruni in person at June 9 screening!
*FRI. JUN 8, 1:45PM; SAT. JUNE 9, 7:30PM
Escort in Love/Nessuno mi puO’giudicare
Massimiliano Bruno, 2011, Italy; 95m
Alice (Paolo Cortellesi) lives a phenomenally pampered life, surrounded by servants and every gadget imaginable. Then one day, her somewhat shady husband is killed in a car accident, and Alice learns the horrible truth: the family is completely broke, all the opulence based on dubious loans tinged with some underworld connections. Alice must find a way to support herself and her son, but she’s a bit lacking in the marketable skills department, until she discovers the wonderful world of escort services. Although still quite attractive, Alice needs some training in what seems to have become a highly professionalized field in contemporary Italy. So she turns to Eva, a long time pro, and soon she’s off to a new career... and an Italy she barely knew existed. In the best tradition of Italian comedy, Escort in Love offers pointed political criticism in between its explosions of laughter. Actor Raul Bove in person!
*SUN. JUN 10, NOON
Horses/Cavalli
Michele Rho, 2011, Italy; 120m
Two brothers, Alessandro and Pietro, live in a small village in the Apennines at the end of the 19th century. When their mother dies, she leaves them with a magnificent bequest: two beautiful horses, from which they can make their livings. Several years later, the brothers are still close, yet it’s clear that each is increasingly eager to pursue his own, very separate dreams. Horses has a welcome, deliberately old fashioned quality: there is a marvelous integration of the stunning natural landscapes and the emotional lives of these characters, and the deliberate comparison between the brothers is never far from the center of narrative attention. Yet the film doesn’t feel mechanical or predictable: even when we can feel the hand of fate in the lives of these characters, we know that at any second the action can hurtle into another direction.
*MON. JUN 11, 8:30PM; TUES. JUN 12, 1:30PM
Kryptonite!/La kryptonite nella borsa
Ivan Cotroneo, 2011, Italy; 99m
Noted screenwriter Ivan Cotroneo (I am Love; Piano, Solo; Paz!) makes an impressive passage to the director’s chair with this sharply observed, bittersweet comedy about a large, colorful Neapolitan family struggling against both changing times and internal tensions. Nine years old in the early Seventies, Peppino sets up the family landscape for us: dad Antonio sells sewing machines when not cheating on his wife Rosaria; his young aunt and uncle, Titina and Salvatore, are enjoying the era’s various revolutions, although not always together; cousin Gennaro wears a cape and thinks he’s Superman. Cotroneo has a terrific sense of the period, which he captures with small but telling details; the world is changing all around his characters, and their anxiety and even befuddlement with this new world is always shown with sympathy—even when it’s laced with humor. The first-rate cast includes Valeria Golino, Luca Zingaretti, Fabrizio Gifuni and Cristina Capotondi. Director Ivan Cotroneo in-person!
*MON. JUN 11, 6:15PM; THURS. JUN 14, 1PM
Là-bas: A Criminal Education/Là-bas
Guido Lombardi, 2011, Italy; 100m
“Down there,” in French “là-bas,” for many Africans is simply a password for Europe, the place that has attracted so many of them in the past decades. One of those caught in web is Yusouf, a talented young artist promised a job by an uncle already established in Italy. Unable at first to find his uncle, Yusouf makes his way to Castel Volturno, about 18 miles from Naples and home to about 20,000 African immigrants, the vast majority clandestine. Discovering the various legal, semi-legal and outright illegal ways these people struggle on day by day, Yusouf also gets to witness the role of the Camorra, Naples’ deadly version of the Mafia, in their use and exploitation. For his first film, Guido Lombardi relied heavily on Kader Alassane, the singer who plays Yusouf and served as Lombardi’s guide into the shadowy world of Africans in Italy. Winner of a “Lion of the Future” award at the 2011 Venice Film Festival. Director Guido Lombardi in person!
*SUN. JUN 10, 10PM
The Legend of Kaspar HAUser/La leggenda di Kaspar HAUser
Davide Manuli, 2012, Italy; 90m
Original, innovative, and often witty, David Manuli’s second film riffs on the famous European legend about Kaspar Houser, the mysterious, “wild boy” who simply appeared on the streets of Nuremberg in 1828. Shot in luscious black-and-white, the film follows this updated Kaspar after he washes up on the beach of an almost deserted Mediterranean island, clad in a track suit and sporting an iPod. Found by the Sheriff (the one and only Vincent Gallo), who thinks the stranger might be some kind of Messiah, Kaspar is initially welcomed into this tiny community. But the Duchess, absolute ruler of the island, feels threatened by this new arrival, and thus sends the Pusher (also the one and only Vincent Gallo) to take care of Kaspar before he becomes a problem. Drawing inspiration and imagery from Westerns, surrealism and sci-fi, The Legend of Kaspar Houser also features an extraordinary, pulsing soundtrack by electronic music composer and sound artist Vitalic. Director Davide Manuli and actor Claudia Gerini in person!
*SAT. JUN 9, 10PM
MAGNIFICENT PRESENCE
Director Ferzan Ozpetek
Photo by Eric Roffman - QPORIT &
Magnificent Presence/Magnifica Presenza
Ferzan Ozpetek, 2012, Italy; 105m
The new film by Ferzan Ozpetek (Steam: The Turkish Bath, Facing Windows) is the story of Pietro (Elio Germano), an aspiring actor approaching 30 who’s just moved to Rome. After crashing with a cousin for a while, Pietro finds his own place, a rather extraordinary apartment offered for an extremely reasonable price. Pietro moves in, but begins to notice that each night when he returns some of his things have been moved. It soon becomes clear to him: Pietro is not living alone. A wry, insightful comedy liberally inspired by Antonio Pietrangeli’s Ghosts of Rome (Fantasmi a Roma), Magnificent Presence has been brilliantly updated and filled out with more details about Pietro’s spectral housemates—who include Margherita Buy, Vittoria Puccini and Cem Yimaz, among others. Shocked and upset (not to mention scared) at first, Pietro soon figures out a way of cohabiting with his lodgers--the only group with which, he has to admit, he’s ever truly felt comfortable. Director Ferzan Ozpetek and actor Elio Germano in person at June 8 screening!
*FRI. JUN 8, 6:15PM; MON. JUN 11, 4PM
My Tomorrow/Il mio domaNI
Marina Spada, 2011, Italy; 88m
As she stands before audiences giving her motivational lectures, human resources manager Monica (Claudia Gerini) is the very portrait of success. Yet there is something that simply doesn’t feel quite right. Is it unfinished business with her father, who lives alone in the country? Or her romance with her boss, who seems to be growing more distant? Or is it her nephew, who’s getting more and more lost while his mother looks on helplessly? Director and co-writer Marina Spade creates a terrifically rich character study that avoids clichés and simple explanations for Monica’s situation, offering a portrait of a very contemporary woman who seems capable of having it all until one day she wakes up and realizes that’s not really what she wants. Spada also offers a fascinating look at Milan, a very different kind of Italy that rarely makes it into the movies. Director Marina Spada in person!
*SAT. JUN 9, 3PM
Seven Acts of Mercy/Sette opere di misericordia
Gianluca and Massimliano De Serio, 2011, Italy/Romania; 103m
One of Cravaggio’s greatest masterworks depicts all seven Christian acts of mercy (feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, etc.) in one magnificent painting; the debut feature of the De Serio brothers depicts a reimagining of these acts in the contemporary relationship between an old man and a desperate young woman. Discharged by the hospital, cancer patient Antonio collapses on his way home and is saved by Luminita, adrift and living on the edge of a shanty town. Going back to Antonio’s house, the two enter into an intense, emotional game of cat and mouse, each vying for control while doing all they can to mask their respective vulnerabilities. The De Serios are blessed with two astonishing lead performances—veteran actor Robert Herlitzka and newcomer Olimpia Melinte—who each bring extraordinary complexity to their characters. A haunting work, and an auspicious debut by two young filmmakers already widely praised for their shorts. Directors Gianluca and Massimliano De Serio in person at June 10 screening!
*SUN. JUN 10, 2:30PM; TUES. JUN 12, 4PM
Shun Li and the Poet/Io sono Li
Andrea Segre, 2011, Italy/France; 96m
Many recent European films have chronicled the social and personal consequences of the recent wave of immigration to Europe, but few with the delicacy and insight of Andre Segre’s lovely film. Brought to Italy by a “broker” who she’s slowly paying off while saving money to bring across her son, Shun Li (Zhao Tao, Jia Zhang-ke’s muse in Platform and The World) is sent from her factory job to a bar in Chioggia, a small island in the Veneto lagoon. There she strikes up a friendship with Bepi, a fisherman nicknamed “the Poet,” himself a representative of an earlier immigration to Italy from Eastern Europe. The two come to share a special understanding between them, and their relationship transforms them both. Segre effectively draws us into this “immigrant world,” not simply to expose its unfairness but to reveal the ways in which immigrants create their own special kinds of support systems. Director Andrea Segre in person!
*SAT. JUN 9, 12:30PM
Step Into Paradise/Posti in piedi in paradisO
Carlo Verdone, 2012, Italy; 119m
One of Italy’s most popular contemporary filmmakers (and frequent Open Roads guest) Carlo Verdone returns to the screen with a kind of Odd Couple for the new millennium. Only now it’s not a couple, but three divorced men who decide to share an apartment together in Rome. All three are drifting towards uncertain futures while still stuck in unresolved pasts. One (Verdone) is a record collector lost in a world of classic rock; another (Pier Francesco Favino) is a former film critic reduced to writing gossip columns. The last (Marco Giallini) tries to sell real estate as kind of excuse to meet women. Clearly a response to the economic and spiritual crisis gripping Italy, Step Into Paradise is not surprisingly also hilarious, one of Verdone’s most sharply observed comedies. These housemates may not know how to solve their own problems, but each is full of ideas about how to help the other two. Actors Pierfrancesco Favino and Marco Giallini in person at June 10 screening!
*SUN. JUN 10, 5PM; MON. JUN 11, 1:30PM
Terraferma
Emanuele Crialese, 2011, Italy/France; 88m
Filippo, whose own father was lost at sea years ago, lives with his mother and grandfather on a small island off the coast of Sicily. Still untouched by tourism, the island faces a challenge from the dozens of clandestine immigrants who each week try to make the island their launch pad for getting to Italy. One day when Filippo and his grandfather Ernesto are off fishing, they see a woman and her son about to drown; they save them and bring them to their house—but will they now report them to the authorities, as has been strictly ordered? A lyrical moral tale for our times, this fourth feature by Emanuele Crialese (Respiro, The Golden Door) combines the dreamy, magical-realist quality that runs through the director’s work with a hard-hitting social critique. Winner of a Special Jury Prize at the 2011 Venice Film Festival. A Cohen Media Group release.
*WED. JUN 13, 2:30PM & 6:15PM
PUBLIC SCREENING SCHEDULE
**in-person appearance
Friday, June 8
1:45 EASY (SCIALLA), 95 min.
4:00 THE CARDBOARD VILLAGE (IL VILLAGIO DI CARTONE), 87 min.
6:15 MAGNIFICENT PRESENCE (MAGNIFICA PRESENZA), 105 min.
**Director Ferzan Ozpetek and actor Elio Germano
9:00 DIAZ: DON’T CLEAN UP THIS BLOOD, 116 min
**Director/Writer Daniele Vicari in-person
Saturday, June 9
12:30 SHUN LI AND THE POET (IO SONO LI), 87 min.
**Director Andrea Segre
3:00 MY TOMORROW (IL MIO DOMANI), 88 min.
**Director Marina Spada
5:30 DANTE FERRETTI: ITALIAN PRODUCTION DESIGNER (DANTE FERRETTI: SCENOGRAFO ITALIANO), 52 min.
**Dante Ferretti
7:30 EASY (SCIALLA), 95 min.
**Director Francesco Bruni
10:00 THE LEGEND OF KASPAR HAUSER (LA LEGGENDA DI KASPAR HAUSER),
90 min.
**Director Davide Manuli and actor Claudia Gerini
Sunday, June 10
12PM ESCORT IN LOVE (NESSUNO MI PUO’GIUDICARE) 95 min
2:30 SEVEN ACTS OF MERCY (SETTE OPERE DI MISERICORDIA), 103 min.
**Directors the De Serio Brothers
5:00 STEP INTO PARADISE (POSTI IN PIEDI IN PARADISO), 119 min.
**Actors Pierfrancesco Favino and Marco Giallini
7:50 THE ARRIVAL OF WANG (L’ARRIVO DI WANG), 80 min.
**Directors the Manetti Brothers
10:00 LA-BAS: CRIMINAL EDUCATION (LA-BAS: EDUCAZIONE CRIMINALE), 100 min.
**Director Guido Lombardi
Monday, June 11
1:30 STEP INTO PARADISE (POSTI IN PIEDI IN PARADISO), 119 min
4:00 MAGNIFICENT PRESENCE (MAGNIFICA PRESENZA), 105 min.
6:15 KRYPTONITE (La kryptonite nella borsa) 98 min
**Director Ivan Cotroneo
8:30 HORSES (CAVALLI), 120 min.
Tuesday, June 12
1:30 HORSES (CAVALLI) 120 min
4:00 SEVEN ACTS OF MERCY (SETTE OPERE DI MISERICORDIA), 103 min.
8:50 THE CARDBOARD VILLAGE (IL VILLAGIO DI CARTONE), 87 min.
Wednesday, June 13
2:15 TERRAFERMA 88 min
4:15 THE ARRIVAL OF WANG (L’ARRIVO DI WANG), 80 min.
6:15 TERRAFERMA 88 min
8:15 ANNALISA (IL PAESE DELLE SPOSE INFELICI), 82 min.
**Director Pippo Mezzapesa
Thursday, June 14
1:00 KRYPTONITE (La kryptonite nella borsa) 98 min
The Film Society receives generous, year-round support from Royal Bank of Canada, American Airlines, The New York Times, Stella Artois, the National Endowment for the Arts and New York State Council on the Arts. For more information, visit www.filmlinc.com and follow @filmlinc on Twitter.com
Labels: Carlo Verdone, Dante Ferretti, Ermanno Olmi, Ferzan Ozpetek, Gianfranco Giagni, MAGNIFICENT PRESENCE, Olimpia Melinte, Open Roads: New Italian Cinema, Pippo Mezzapesa, Robert Herlitzka
