Italian Cinema Today

It's not often that a filmmaker's first feature scores a coveted spot in the lineup of the Venice Film Festival but such was the case with Palermo-born director Giovanni Totaro. He presented his first feature-length film, a documentary,  last September at the 74th Venice International Film Festival . " Happy Winter"   was in the Official Selection of the festival but not in competition. Every summer on Palermo's famed Mondello beach, over one thousand wooden huts are constructed as a summer tradition for local beachgoers. For these southerners who typically love the sea, they spend three months in paradise watching the sun rise and set over the majestic Mediterranean. During the summer, the beaches are taken over by families, sun-bathers and even politicians canvasing for votes. However, in the last few years, there has been a decrease in the huts being built due to an economic crisis and many Sicilians are afraid of losing their cherished summer get-a-way.

This week, the Berlin International Film Festival announced the lineup of its 12th Culinary Cinema program. Each year, there is a theme and this year, organizers chose the motto “Life Is Delicate”. The lineup consists of nine documentaries and one fictional film, all with the focus on the relationship between food, culture, and politics. “When it comes to cultural and political matters, sensitive decisions have to be made all the time. It’s like in a kitchen, where it’s also tricky to make, at the very least, something edible and, at the very best, something delicate,” Festival Director Dieter Kosslick says in explaining the motto. The 2018 lineup includes one Italian film. Jacopo Quadri's documentary Lorello e Brunello is the story twin brothers whose lives revolve around taking care of their farm. Set in Pianetti di Sovana, located in the province of Grosseto in Tuscany, Quadri explores the endless efforts in keeping up with the global economic market's dropping pric

I remember reading a beautiful article by the New York Times in October of 2016 when playwright Dario Fo passed away. It was one of the most comprehensive obituaries I had ever read and it sparked my curiosity about Fo's life and what inspired him to write such moving, controversial works. The Times article stated that Fo was "best known for two works: "Accidental Death of an Anarchist" (1970), a play based on the case of an Italian railroad worker who was either thrown or fell from the upper story of a Milan police station while being questioned on suspicion of terrorism; and his one-man show "Mistero Buffo" (Comic Mystery), written in 1969 and frequently revised and updated in the decades that followed, taking wild comic aim at politics and especially religion.  After a 1977 version of "Mistero Buffo" was broadcast in Italy, the Vatican denounced it as 'the most blasphemous show in the history of television.'  The c