Skip to main content

Sicily Through the Eyes and Heart of Emanuele Crialese

Emanuele Crialese 

Emanuele Crialese is one of the most inventive and poetic filmmakers working today. The messages in his films speak to the dreams and desires within the soul, and their breathtaking cinematography reveals the  pride he feels for a land to which he is deeply connected.

Born in Rome in 1965, Emanuele Crialese’s Sicilian roots are the driving force to the plots of his movies. Crialese earned his degree at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts.  He originally set out to take a short film course at the university but was granted a full scholarship after presenting a sample of his work. Much of Crialese’s career has been dedicated to exploring the plight of the immigrant, and the irony of this lies within the fact that while in New York City attending film school, he lived in a Lower East Side tenement, which was once occupied by immigrants during the immigration wave of the 20th century. One has to wonder if that experience has had any influence on his work today. Crialese made a number of short films during his years in New York, and then made his first feature in 1997. The film, "Once We Were Strangers," is about a Sicilian man living illegally in New York wandering from job to job when he falls in love with a local radio show host.  The story follows the lives of a number of immigrants living in New York including those from India. The film is about the culture clashes and expectations of immigrants coming to America in search of a better life. 

Upon his return to Italy, Crialese made the visually stunning masterpiece, "Respiro." Staring Valeria Golino and Vincenzo Amato, the film was shot on the Sicilian island of Lampedusa and tells the story of a not so traditional mother and wife who struggles with meeting the demands of a politically correct society in a village where everyone knows your business. It's a story of freedom, self-expression and love that was shot in a place as close to paradise as one can get. The film has been a huge international success thanks to its beautiful landscapes and timeless story. 


Nuovomondo

His next film "Nuovomondo" (Golden Door), was released in 2006, and again focuses on the Sicilian culture. This time, Crialese travels back to the beginning of the 20th century and examines the experience of immigration to the United States from the perspective of Sicilian peasants. It's a beautiful yet heartbreaking portrait of an immigrant faced with the daunting task of leaving his home forever. It's an emotional journey through the eyes of a man trying to make a better life for his family. The film gives insight into the conditions and struggles that our own ancestors must have faced when making that life-changing decision so many generations ago. Crialese has said that he found inspiration to write the story when he visited Ellis Island back in the '90s and saw photographs of people “looking into the camera as though it was a strange instrument.” Those images made him fantasize about the immigrants’ past and culture. He started to research the topic and discovered a passion for the story which ultimately led him to make this film. Part of that research included reading letters the immigrants sent home. He wanted to make a film about “the kind of man who was willing to cross the ocean to go to an unknown place.”  

Perhaps he kept that research in mind when making his latest film, "Terraferma." It's another work that deals with the topic of immigration. This time, however, the immigrants are not Italian. The film tackles Italy’s current issue with clandestine immigrants. The plot explores the moral side of the issue when a Sicilian family helps save an immigrant mother and child from drowning and takes them into their home. Such practice is illegal and the family faces criminal charges. The screenplay was articulately written and directed as Crialese shows the growing problem of illegal immigration from multiple angles. The film premiered at last year’s Venice Film Festival and took home a Special Jury Prize. It was also Italy’s submission for the 2011 Academy Awards, but unfortunately was not on the final ballot.

Terraferma

In 2018, Crialese directed Episode 8 of the FX Network series, "Trust," which recounts the 1973 kidnapping of John Paul Getty III. The episode, titled, “In the Name of the Father,” shot entirely on location in Calabria, was hailed by The New York Times as the best episode of the series. Click here to read my interview with Fortunato Verduci, one of the regional actors featured in the episode. It's available to stream on numerous platforms, including-  Hulu, YouTube, Amazon Prime, Sling and Google Play.
Crialese is such a relevant filmmaker because his work shows the ideals of a country that is anchored in tradition while exploring the current issues of its modern inhabitants.  He does so in a unique way that captures the physical, magical and emotional aspects of Sicily’s Mediterranean beauty.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Anna Foglietta: Actress and Activist with Old School Elegance

One look at actress Anna Foglietta in her any of her roles, and the Golden Age of Italian cinema comes to mind. Among Italy’s most sought-after actresses today, Foglietta brings to the table a classic eloquence of yesterday while representing Italy’s modern woman. Born in Rome in 1979, Foglietta began her career in 2005 with a role in the RAI television series La squadra . Her character Agent Anna De Luca had a two-year run on the series as she was transitioning to cinema with Paolo Virzì’s 2006 ensemble project 4-4-2- Il gioco più bello del mondo . Since then, she has become one of Italy’s most diverse actresses, transforming herself into interesting, layered characters for comedies and dramas alike. Aside from a small part in Anton Corbijn’s 2010 film The American starring George Clooney, Foglietta’s work began reaching mainstream American audiences in 2015. As Elisa in Edoardo Leo’s 2015 comedy Noi e la Giulia , Foglietta showed her funny side playing a goofball pregn...
Post a Comment
Read more

Review: Emma Dante's 'The Macaluso Sisters'

In a moving story that spans several decades, “The Macaluso Sisters” follows five orphaned sisters born and raised in an apartment on Palermo’s outskirts. They support themselves by renting out pigeons for events, a unique and symbolic business that reflects their resourcefulness and the transient nature of their lives. Directed by Emma Dante, who adapted the script from her 2014 play of the same name, the film boasts an all-female cast that brings a unique power to the story. It unfolds in three chapters that show how the tragic events of one day haunt the sisters through childhood, adulthood and old age.   The first chapter reveals the tragedy of the youngest sister, Antonella, who dies during a beach outing. She remains a permanent presence in the household, never aging. The film returns again and again to the beauty of the day at the beach when tragedy struck. The apartment is a central character, housing the memories and rage each sister carries inside her. This exploration of...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Timeless Talent of Stefania Sandrelli

On screen since the tender age of 14, she has captivated audiences for more than 50 years with a compelling combination of strength and vulnerability. She achieved stardom at just 14 years old playing the angelic cousin of a love-struck Marcello Mastroianni in Pietro Germi’s “Divorce Italian Style.” More than half a century later, she is still going strong and remains one of Italy’s most esteemed actors. Stefania Sandrelli was born on June 5, 1946, in Viareggio in the province of Lucca in northern Italy. As a child, she studied music and dance. Then in 1960, she won a beauty pageant and was featured on the cover of Le Ore magazine. Her purity captivated the country and shortly thereafter, movie offers began pouring in. Just one year later, she made her cinema debut in three feature films: Mario Sequi’s Gioventù di notte , Luciano Salce’s The Fascist, and Pietro Germi’s Divorce Italian Style . She instantly became a star and before long was a key figure in Italy’s legend...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Sweetness and Genius of Giulietta Masina

Fellini and Masina on the set of "La Strada" As open-hearted and sunny as Federico Fellini was dark and complex, they were perfect counterpoints during a half-century of marriage and professional collaboration.  Nicknamed a  “female Chaplin” and described by Chaplin himself as  the actress who moved him most,  Giulietta Masina confronted the tragedy of her characters with an eternal innocence and enthusiasm that gave Italians hope in the most challenging of times.  Born in 1921 in San Giorgio di Piano, a commune north of Bologna, Masina was the oldest of four children born to a father who was a music professor and violinist and a mother who was a grade-school teacher. Her parents sent her as a child to live in Rome with her widowed aunt while she attended school there. As Masina took an early interest in gymnastics, her aunt saw in her a passion for performing and encouraged her to pursue acting. So after high school, Masina attended Rome’s La...
Post a Comment
Read more

A Conversation with Actor Mirko Frezza of David di Donatello Winner "Il più grande sogno"

The 2017 David di Donatello award show, which took place on Monday, was an exciting event that celebrated many great contemporary talents of Italian cinema.  I was fortunate to have seen most of the nominees.  Among my personal favorites  is Michele Vannucci's  Il più grande sogno  simply because it is based on one of the most inspiring, beautiful stories I've ever  heard, and the person behind that story is as authentic and down-to-earth as they come. The film won the 3 Future Award, which is determined by the public. With Director Michele Vannucci and Actor Mirko Frezza I first saw  Il più grande sogno last September when it premiered at the Venice Film Festival. I didn't make it to Venice, but thanks to a great online platform called Festival Scope , which offers a handful of premieres to be screened on the web, I felt like I was there. The film itself blew me away, and then when I realized it was based on a true story, I knew t...
Post a Comment
Read more