Ischia Film Festival Celebrates Location of Francesco Munzi's "Black Souls"

The Ionic Sea along the town of Africo (Photo by Actor, Stefano Priolo of Black Souls)

Out of the 109 films selected for the festival, 54 will be enjoying their national premieres, 2 their international premieres and 2 their European premieres. 42 are Italian productions or co-productions, and the competition will feature 40 films, including feature films, documentaries and short films, which will battle it out for the festival’s awards.

From 27 June to 4 July 2015, the 13th edition of the Ischia Film Festival will be held at the Aragonese Castle in Ischia. It is the only international competition dedicated to cinematographic locations that gives artistic recognition to audiovisual works, directors, directors of cinematography and set designers that endorse Italian and international locations, putting the emphasis on the landscape and cultural identity.

Out of the 109 films selected for the festival, 54 will be enjoying their national premieres, 2 their international premieres and 2 their European premieres. 42 are Italian productions or co-productions, and the competition will feature 40 films, including feature films, documentaries and short films, which will battle it out for the festival’s awards.

The festival awarded the multi-award-winning writer of Black Souls, Francesco Munzi (who won 9 David di Donatello awards including for Best Film and Best Director) the Ischia Film Award 2015, naming him Best Director of the year. The award, which has previously been given to illustrious people from the world of film such as the French director Benoit Jacquot and the Oscar-winning Bille August, will be awarded on 29 June.

As a way of promoting the land through audiovisuals in collaboration with independent festivals, the Ischia Film Festival will once again be showcasing films set on the Baltic Coast this year. In collaboration with the biggest promoter of films from Northern Europe, the Nordische Filmtage Lübeck, for the fourth year running some of the biggest cinematographic works of 2014 (none of which were released in Italy) that place greatest emphasis on the cultural identity of the countries of Northern Europe will be screened.

Opening the focus will be Norwegian director Jan Vardøen with the Italian premiere of Heart of Lightness, which is based on the piece of theatre by Henrik Ibsen. The focus will feature other important films such as the Swedish film Och Piccadilly Circus ligger inte i Kumla by director Bengt Danneborn, the Finnish documentary Joka muistaa vähän enempi by Minna Valjane, the Latvian documentary Pelican in the desert by Viesturs Kairišs and a film set in the Faroe Islands, Ludo, by Katrin Ottarsdóttir, who will be attending the festival with his producer Hugin Eide.

On 2 July the Ischia Film Festival will be hosting the Bari branch of Creative Europe Desk Media for an info day on the MEDIA sub-programme of Europa Creativa.

-Written by Camillo De Marco for Cineuropa

Comments

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...

Ornella Muti: Five decades of Acting and Still Going Strong

Ornella Muti was born Francesca Romana Rivelli in Rome in 1955 to a Neapolitan father and an Estonian mother. She began her career as a model during her teenage years and made her film debut in 1970 with “La Moglie più bella” (The Most Beautiful Wife). Her follow-up role was in the 1971 film, “Sole nella pelle” (Sun on the Skin), in which she played the daughter of wealthy parents who runs off with a hippie they don’t approve of. The film offers a telling journey through Italian society in the seventies, with its political climate, breathtaking seaside, and the styles and cars of that time. Much of the film is set amid the sunny Italian seaside and captures the innocence and beauty of first love. Muti made her American film debut in 1980 with "Flash Gordon." She played the role of Princess Aura. She’s appeared in two other American films, including “Oscar,” directed by John Landis and starring Don Ameche, Chazz Palminteri, and Sylvester Stallone. In 1992, she w...

Alessandro Gassmann: Born to Act

Alessandro Gassmannin his directorial debut "Razzabastarda" Alessandro Gassmann is the son of the iconic Italian actor/director Vittorio Gassman and French actress Juliette Mayniel. He was born in 1965 and grew up around cinema royalty. He made his cinema debut in 1982 at the age of 17 in his father's autobiographical film, "Di padre in figlio." He went on to study his craft under his father's direction at the Theatre Workshop of Florence. Vittorio Gassman was very active in theater and seemed just as comfortable on stage as he did in front of the camera. Known for his powerful interpretations of Dante's "Inferno" and "Paradiso," it is no surprise that he nurtured his son's acting aspirations on stage before he launched his career in television and film. One of Gassmann's strong qualities, which he undoubtedly inherited from his father is his incredible range and ease in going from genre to genre. He can play ...

A Conversation with Documentary Filmmaker Luigi Di Gianni

His documentary films have given voice to a people who would have otherwise been forgotten while preserving rituals and traditions no longer practiced. Visually stunning and emotionally moving, they reflect an Italy we’re not used to seeing in cinema. Born in Naples in 1926, Luigi Di Gianni captured a dimension of Italy that people outside the South didn’t even know existed. He began his career working in the region of Basilicata, which back then was referred to as Lucania. He first visited the region with his parents when he was a boy. His father, being from the Lucanian village of Pescopagano, wanted to show his son his homeland. That trip made an impression on the 9-year-old and created a deep affection that would one day inspire him to return. “I always remained very emotional about returning to this part of my homeland of Lucania,” he says. “It seemed like a different planet compared to Rome, where I lived. The tiring journey, the unpaved roads, the difficulti...

The Timeless Vision of Pier Paolo Pasolini

Pondering his films and poetry, I wonder if the uniqueness of Pier Paolo Pasolini's films was rooted in his unconventional childhood. Born in Bologna in 1922, Pasolini's father was a lieutenant in the army, and his family was always moving. He grew up in various small towns in Northern Italy. After his parents separated, he spent most of his time in his mother's hometown of Casarsa, in the region of Friuli Venezia Giulia. There, he grew to respect the area's peasant culture and began to write poetry in the region's dialect. He studied literature and art history at the University of Bologna and was drafted into the army during World War II. The war proved to be especially tragic for his family as his younger brother was executed by Communist partisans. Following the war, he returned to Casarsa where he worked as a teacher and ironically became a leading member of the Communist party there. Pasolini was later expelled from the party due to allegations of homo...

Italian Cinema Today

Search This Blog