37TFF TORINO FILM FESTIVAL - 22-30 NOVEMBRE 2019
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2019
22—30
FILM
NOVEMBRE
37TFF
TORINO
FESTIVAL
Graphic Design BRH+ © TCD/Prod.DB / Alamy Stock Photocon il contributo di con il sostegno di main media partner main sponsor sponsor vettore ufficiale official car partner tecnici partner culturali Industry partner media partner
PRESS KIT
37th TORINO FILM FESTIVAL
NOVEMBER 22 – 30, 2019
This press kit was prepared for the press conference
presenting the 37th Torino Film Festival:
Rome, November 14, 2019, 10:30 a.m., Casa del Cinema
Turin, November 14, 2019, 6:45 p.m., Multisala Cinema Massimo
(The press kit was completed on November 10, 2019)
Torino Film Festival
Via Montebello, 15 – 10124 Turin
Tel. +39 011 8138825 - 820
http: //www.torinofilmfest.org
e-mail: press@torinofilmfest.org
37th Torino Film Festival 1Index 37th TFF - information & utilities 3 EVENTS of the 37th TFF 6 GRAN PREMIO TORINO Barbara Steele by Emanuela Martini 8 37th TFF – numbers & guests 9 37th TFF – opening and closing films 10 TORINO 37 11 FESTA MOBILE by Emanuela Martini 14 FIVE GREAT EMOTIONS by Carlo Verdone 23 AFTER HOURS by Emanuela Martini 25 TFFdoc by Davide Oberto 29 ITALIANA.CORTI by Davide Oberto 34 ONDE & ONDE-ARTRUM by Massimo Causo 36 IT COULD WORK! CLASSIC HORROR, 1919 – 1969 by Emanuela Martini 40 JURIES 47 AWARDS AND COLLATERAL AWARDS 48 COLOPHON 49 TORINOFILMLAB 53 37th Torino Film Festival 2
37th TFF – information & utilities Torino Film Festival Headquarters: Via Montebello, 15 - 10124 Turin Tel.: +39 011 8138811 http: //www.torinofilmfest.org E-mail: info@torinofilmfest.org http://www.facebook.com/torinofilmfestival https://twitter.com/torinofilmfest TEMPORARY OFFICES DURING THE FESTIVAL SWITCHBOARD: +39 011 19887500 Fax: +39 011 19887527 RAI - Via G. Verdi, 14 November 22 - 30, 2019 Opening hours: 9 a.m. - 1 p.m. / 2 p.m. - 6 p.m. SWITCHBOARD: +39 011 19887500 FAX: +39 011 19887527 MANAGEMENT: +39 011 19887501 GENERAL SECRETARIAT: +39 011 19887505 HOSPITALITY OFFICE: +39 011 19887509 / 011 19887511 - 011 19887514 PRESS OFFICE: +39 011 19887516 / 011 19887518 INTERNATIONAL PRESS OFFICE: +39 011 19887522 PRESS ROOM / OPENING HOURS:10 A.M. - 7 P.M. ACCREDITATION OFFICE: November 21: only accreditation passes prepaid online will be issued / Opening hours: noon – 6 p.m. November 22 - 30 / Opening hours: 9 a.m. - 6 p.m. SCREENINGS MULTISALA CINEMA MASSIMO Via G. Verdi, 18 +39 011 8138574 Cinemas accessible to the disabled MULTISALA REPOSI Via XX Settembre, 15 +39 011 531400 Sale 1, 2, 3 accessible to the disabled CINEMA CLASSICO SCREENINGS RESERVED TO THE PRESS Piazza Vittorio Veneto, 5 +39 011 5363323 Cinema accessible to the disabled PRESS CONFERENCES AND ACTIVITIES RAI – RADIO AND TELEVISION MUSEUM Via G. Verdi, 16 (November 23 – 30, 2019) PIAZZA TFF Mole Antonelliana - Cafeteria and events November 23 – 30, 2019 From 9:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Entrance free of charge 37th Torino Film Festival 3
ENTRANCE Access to the screenings Access is given to spectators holding tickets, accreditation passes, or festival passes,limited to available seating. Spectators holding tickets are asked to arrive at least 5 minutes before the screening begins. In order to avoid disturbing other spectators, entrance will not be allowed once the screening has begun. Spectators under the age of 18 will not be given access to the screening of films without a censor rating. Minors will be allowed to the projections only if specific indications are listed in the program alongside the film's synopsis. Passes and tickets may not be substituted or reimbursed, except for screenings which are canceled by the organizers. Films in foreign languages are always subtitled in Italian. Subtitling in other languages is indicated for every screening in the program. Purchasing tickets online ticket office Tickets and full-price passes can be prepurchased at the festival's website www.torinofilmfest.org starting November 14 at approximately 2 p.m. Online sales will continue throughout the duration of the festival, up until 24 hours before the start of each screening. During the festival, tickets and passes which are prepurchased online must be collected at the cinema box offices during the regular opening hours, by presenting the code which was provided at the moment of purchase. It is recommended that tickets be collected at least 15 minutes before the start of the screening. Purchasing tickets at the cinema box offices On November 22, the Cinema Massimo and Cinema Reposi outdoor box offices will be open from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. From November 23 – 30, the box offices will open 30 minutes before the beginning of the program- ming and will remain open until the start of the final screening. On the occasion of “Notte Horror,” the Cinema Massimo box office will remain open until 3:15 a.m. or until tickets to the screenings are sold out. The cinema box offices will also sell tickets and passes, both full price and reduced price. In order to purchase reduced-price tickets and passes, a document (identity card) or affiliated membership card must be presented. Passes and accreditation passes Screenings will be marked on the program in different colors. White: screenings which are accessible to accreditation and pass holders, limited to available seating, by presenting one's accreditation or pass at the entrance to the cinema. Blue: screenings for which accreditation and pass holders must collect, free of charge, a reservation slip (blue ticket) at the totems (h24/24) and at the Cinema Reposi indoor box office (from its opening until 10 p.m.). The reservation slip must be collected between 9 a.m. of the day before the screening and 1 p.m. on the day of the screening. Entrance to the cinema for the holders of blue tickets is guaranteed until five minutes before the beginning of the screening, after which the rush line will be activated, allowing the holders of accreditations and pass holders who do not have a blue ticket to enter the cinema, until all the seats have been filled. Anyone who doesn't use their blue ticket three times, even non-consecutively, or enters the cinema after the rush line has been activated, will no longer be issued other blue tickets and will only be able to access the screenings through the rush line. For this reason, within 30 minutes of the start of the screening, blue tickets which have already been issued can be voided at the automatic box offices, thereby avoiding penalties. Only one ticket may be collected for each screening time slot. Yellow – PRESS SCREENINGS: indicates the screenings reserved to accredited members of the press, at th Cinema Classico. Press accreditation passes featuring a yellow sticker will be given priority access. Opening and closing ceremonies The opening ceremony, followed by a screening of the film Jojo Rabbit on Friday, November 22, and the awards ceremony on Saturday, November 30, are by invitation only. REPEAT SCREENINGS ON SUNDAY, DECEMBER 1 Repeat screenings of the winning films will take place at Cinema Massimo on December 1, starting at ap- proximately 3 p.m. The tickets will be sold only at the Cinema Massimo box office starting at 1 p.m. that same day. The program will be published on the festival's website and at the festival venues on November 30, starting at 8:30 p.m. Access will be given to accreditation holders, holders of passes to the entire festi- val, and 9-19 weekly passes, and will follow the procedures for the white screenings. 37th Torino Film Festival 4
CINEMAS ACCESSIBLE TO PEOPLE WITH IMPAIRED MOBILITY ON WHEELCHAIRS Entrance is free of charge, without a caregiver, and limited to available seating. CALENDAR OF PRESS ENCOUNTERS AND CONFERENCES The calendar will be available in the cinemas, at the accreditation office, and online starting November 22. Participation at press conferences and encounters with the public implies one's consent to be photographed and/or filmed. Participation at the encounters implies one's consent to be photographed or filmed. Ticket and pass prices FULL-PRICE TICKET: 7.00 Euros REDUCED-PRICE TICKET: 5.00 Euros FULL-PRICE PASS (*): 90.00 Euros | Strictly personal and non-transferable, it gives access to all the screenings, except for the opening and awards ceremonies. REDUCED-PRICE PASS (*): 70.00 Euros | Strictly personal and non-transferable, it gives access to all the screenings, except for the opening and awards ceremonies. 9 – 19 PASS (*): 45.00 Euros |Strictly personal and non-transferable, it gives access to all the screenings which begin before 7 p.m. 9 – 19 DAY PASS (*): 14.00 Euros| Valid for a specific day. Gives access to the screenings that begin before 7 p.m. DISCOUNTS: Aiace, Abbonamento Musei Torino Piemonte, Torino+Piemonte card, Intesa Sanpaolo personal debit or credit cards, Carta Stabile, ALI members, RAI employees, young people up to 26 years old, Over 65. (*) passes and day passes do not give access to blue screenings without an entrance slip, which may be collected free of charge at the dedicated box offices. From November 22 – 30, all holders of passes or tickets to the Torino Film Festival may purchase a ticket to visit the National Cinema Museum at a reduced price. BOOKS GENERAL CATALOGUE Edizioni Museo Nazionale del Cinema Italiano/English Can be downloaded at www.torinofilmfest.org DA CALIGARI AGLI ZOMBIE L’HORROR CLASSICO, 1919 - 1969 edited by Emanuela Martini Editrice Il Castoro Available at the Mole Antonelliana bookshop from November 22 until December 1 with a 15% discount. 37th Torino Film Festival 5
EVENTS of the 37th TFF
Thursday, November 21, 9 p.m.
Teatro Regio Turin
“PRENDETE POSTO. INIZIA IL FILM.”
INAUGURAL CONCERT OF TORINO CITTÀ DEL CINEMA 2020 ON THE OCCASION OF THE 37th TFF
The Orchestra of the Teatro Regio performs the soundtracks which made Italian film history.
Teatro Regio Box Office
Piazza Castello 215 – Torino. Tickets: 5.00 Euros
Info: www.teatroregio.torino.it www.torinocittadelcinema2020.it
A project of: City of Turin, National Cinema Museum of Turin, Film Commission Torino Piemonte
Realized by: Fondazione per la Cultura Torino
In collaboration with: Teatro Regio Torino, Associazione Compositori Musica per Film, Torino Film Festival
Partner: Intesa Sanpaolo
***
Saturday, November 23
3 p.m. - Cinema Reposi, sala 2
Free of charge
Torino Short Film Market presents All You Need Is Short
a selection of international shorts which are unreleased in Italy
Midnight – Cinema Massimo 1
NOTTE HORROR
Program:
BLOOD QUANTUM by Jeff Barnaby (Canada, 2019, DCP, 96’)
CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON by Jack Arnold (USA, 1954, DCP, 79’)
THE LODGE by Severin Fiala and Veronika Franz (UK, 2019, DCP, 100’)
Italian subtitles
***
Sunday, November 24, 10:15 p.m.
Cinema Massimo, sala 1
Hamilton Award: presented to Brian Welsh
Followed by a screening of the film Beats by Brian Welsh (UK, 2019, DCP, 101’), presented in the Festa
Mobile section of the 37thTFF
***
Monday, November 25, 6 p.m.
at the Auditorium of the Intesa Sanpaolo skyscraper, Corso Inghilterra 3
Entrance free of charge but reservations are required starting November 15 at 10 a.m. at
www.torinofilmfest.org and at www.grattacielointesasanpaolo.com
World premiere screening of the film VACCINI. 9 LEZIONI DI SCIENZA by Elisabetta Sgarbi
***
Tuesday, November 26, 9 a.m.
Auditorium “Guido Quazza” - Palazzo Nuovo Via Sant’Ottavio 20, Level -1
MARIO SOLDATI: LETTERATURA, CINEMA E DINTORNI
Study seminar
Free of charge
3 p.m.
Auditorium “Guido Quazza” - Palazzo Nuovo Via Sant’Ottavio 20, Level -1
CONFERENCE BY KRISTIN THOMPSON
Free of charge
4:30 p.m.
Auditorium “Guido Quazza” - Palazzo Nuovo Via Sant’Ottavio 20, Level -1
CONFERENCE BY DAVID BORDWELL
Free of charge
***
37th Torino Film Festival 6Wednesday, November 27, 8:15 p.m. - Cinema Massimo 3
Gran Premio Torino Award presented to Barbara Steele. Followed by a screening of the film
LA MASCHERA DEL DEMONIO by Mario Bava (Italy, 1960, DCP, 87’)
***
Thursday, November 28, 11 a.m. - Cinema MASSIMO 3
L’HORROR CLASSICO: DA CALIGARI AGLI ZOMBIE
Panel dedicated to the 2019 retrospective. Free of charge.
3 p.m.
Auditorium “Guido Quazza” - Palazzo Nuovo Via Sant’Ottavio 20, Level -1
L’ULTIMO PIANO
by the “G.M. Volonté” Film School (Italy, 2019, 87’) Free of charge.
***
Friday, November 29, 2:30 p.m.
Cinema Reposi, sala 1
Free of charge
TORINO FACTORY
Second edition of the Glocal Video Contest for filmmakers Under 30.
5:30 p.m.
Cinema Reposi, sala 1
CINEMA D’AQCUA
First edition of the contest for Italian short films organized by QC terme.
Free of charge
8 p.m.
CHARITY DINNER PREPARED BY STARRED CHEFS
LANGHE ROERO E MONFERRATO AWARD
PRESENTED TO MAESTRO ROBERTO BENIGNI
Proceeds will be donated to the Fondazione per la Ricerca sul Cancro Onlus. For more info:
www.fctp.it/premio-langhe-roero-monferrato.php
37th Torino Film Festival 7GRAN PREMIO TORINO – Barbara Steele
In his 1997 book A-Z of Horror, Clive Barker (author, director, cartoonist, the creator of the Cenobites,
Candyman, Cabal, and Hellraiser) entitled the letter M “Mistress of the Night” and dedicated it to Barbara
Steele, who, Barker wrote, “does what few actresses are capable of doing: she lets you see both destruction
and delight in the same pair of eyes.” And he added the opinions of some of the directors who have worked
with her, such as Roger Corman, who directed her in The Pit and the Pendulum: “There was a depth to her.
On the surface she was a beautiful brunette woman. Beneath that – and you could almost get poetic here
looking into her eyes – you could see layer, upon layer, upon layer. I could probably best, and inadequately,
describe it as a kind of exotic mystery.” Or Riccardo Freda: “She has metaphysical eyes, they are not real,
it's not possible, they are De Chirico eyes. In certain conditions of light and color her face assumes a cast
that doesn't appear to be quite human.” Barbara Steele, said Tim Burton, is probably the only true diva of
horror. Timeless. An icon balancing between the still classic horror of the 1960s and the new horror that was
to follow.
Barbara Steele debuted in England and, after an initial, unsuccessful phase in Hollywood, went to Italy in
1960, where she immediately came into contact with the director and the genre which would turn her into
a star: Mario Bava, who was getting his start in directing with The Mask of Satan, a cornerstone of Italy's
nascent wave of goth cinema. Tall, willowy, an oval face with sharp accents, enormous eyes, she was the
indisputable mistress of the movies by Bava, Freda, Margheriti, Caiano, and others, a strong and mysterious
presence who was able to transmit both the torment of Evil and the ambiguity of Good. Most often, she was
a “Queen of the Dark,” a vampire, a witch, a ghost, a demonic lover, but sometimes she was also a lady in
distress. Or a “pretend 'good guy,'” or she played a double role in diabolical reincarnations. She became a
familiar presence in Italy, where she also acted in a few comedies and had two remarkable roles: the catlike
Gloria of Guido's seraglio in 8 1/2 by Fellini and the wild Byzantine princess in For Love and Gold by Monicelli.
Over the following decades, Hollywood's new maestros, Joe Dante, Cronenberg, and Jonathan Demme,
turned to her evocative presence. She was – and remains – one of the most mysterious creatures of the silver
screen, still today the true “Mistress of the Night.”
(Emanuela Martini)
The Gran Premio Torino award will be presented to Barbara Steele on Wednesday, November 27 at 8:15
p.m. at Cinema Massimo - sala 3, followed by the screening of the film directed by Maio Bava, La
maschera del demonio (Italy, 1960, DCP, 87’).
37th Torino Film Festival 837th TFF - numbers & guests
149 feature-length, 11 medium-length, and 31 short films
presented at the 2019 Torino Film Festival, of which
44 feature length films are first or second works
45 world premieres
28 international premieres
64 Italian premieres
selected from over 4,000 movies viewed (shorts, medium-length, and feature-length)
Participation confirmed to date:
Laura Accerboni, Altan, Julia Alves, Gianni Amelio, Marilena Anniballi, Fabienne Babe, Angelo Barbagallo,
Marcelo Barbosa, Pietro Bartolo, Giuseppe Battiston, Hilal Baydarov, Pier Giorgio Bellocchio, Franco “Bifo”
Berardi, Antonio Bertoni, Alessandro Bignami, Bruno Bigoni, Elia Billoni, Mattia Biondi, Giuseppe Boccassini,
Giacomo Bolzani, Hinde Boujemaa, Flavia Bruscia, Robert Byington, Andrea Caccia, Massimo Cacciari, Carlo
Cagnasso, Giovanni Calcagno, Saverio Cappiello, Mattia Carratello, Philip Cartelli, Lucio Castro, Martina
Catalfamo, Teco Celio, Harry Cepka, Aichi Chen, Hoping Chen, Mariangela Ciccarello, Roberto Citran,
Emanuele Coccia, Milena Cocozza, Giorgio Colangeli, Marc Collin, Cristina Comencini, Stefano Consiglio,
Kelly Copper, Giulia Cosentino, Grégoire Couvert, Carolina Crescentini, Salvo Cuccia, Moisè Curia, Valentina
De Amicis, Tonino De Bernardi, Davide Del Degan, Alberto Diana, Gianni Di Gregorio, Francesco Di Nuzzo,
Benjamin Domenech, Francesco Dongiovanni, Gianpaolo Donzelli, Marta Donzelli, Tiziano Doria, Ginevra
Elkann, Juliet Esey Joseph, Mirko Fabbri, Lorenzo Fantastichini, Sara Fattahi, Dario Fedele, Hassen Ferhani,
Alejandro Fernández Almendras, Daniela Ferrari, Davide Ferrario, Camilla Filippi, Flatform, Stefano Fresi,
Enrico Ganni, Amparo Garrido, Giuseppe Gaudino, Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia, Riccardo Giacconi, Damiano
Giacomelli, Demetrio Giacomelli, Marco Tullio Giordana, Grace Glowicki, Andrea Grasselli, Francesco
Grieco, Roman Griffin Davis, Samira Guadagnuolo, Thomas Heise, Sang-gil Hwang, Luca Iacoella, Natalia
Imery Almario, Hong-Sun Kim, Julius Krebs Damsbo, Elsa Kremser, Wilma Labate, Christian Labhart,
Alessandra Lancellotti, Giulia Lapenna, Beppe Leonetti, Danielle Lessovitz, Stefano Levi della Torre, Simone
Liberati, Lungwen Lim, Lungyin Lim, Pavol Liska, Francesca Lolli, Davide Maldi, Anna Malfatti, Chiara Malta,
Manetti Bros., Simone Manetti, Narimane Mari, Catrinel Marlon, Diana Martirosyan, Enrico Masi, Eleonora
Mastropietro, Gianluca Matarrese, Bruce McDonald, Callisto Mc Nulty, Pippo Mezzapesa, Stefano Migliore,
Orso e Peter Miyakawa, Damien Modolo, Alejo Moguillansky, Enzo Monteleone, Francesco Motta, Carthew
Neal, Erik Negro, Vincenzo Nemolato, Agostino Nestola, Betta Olmi, Grégoire Orio, Antonio Padovan,
Gandolfo Pagano, Donatella Palermo, Gabriella Palermo, Gregorio Paonessa, Emmanuel Parraud, Fabrizio
Paterniti Martello, Vladimir Perisic, Levin Peter, Carlo Petrini, Marco Pettenello, Emmanuel Piton, Corneliu
Porumboiu, Filipa Ramos, Stefano Ratchev, Lisa Reboulleau, Anna Recalde Miranda, Eran Riklis, Jorge
Riquelme Serrano, Bruno Risas, Daniel Russo, Bruno Safadi, Isabella Sandri, Sabrina Sarabi, Carlo Michele
Schirinzi, Albert Serra, Elisabetta Sgarbi, Anna Soldati, Filo Sottile, Zachary Spicer, Dante e Marcella
Spinotti, Riccardo Spinotti, Monica Stambrini, Barbara Steele, Heidi Strobel, Teona Strugar Mitevska,
Studenti scuola Gianmaria Volonté, Milad Tangshir, Gaël Teicher, Cosimo Terlizzi, Cosimo Torlo, Marie-Claude
Treilhou, Jasmine Trinca, Giovanni Troilo, Azegiñe Urigoitia, Peter Van den Begin, Carlo Verdone, Lucio
Villani, Misha Wahrmann, Brian Welsh, Annina Wettstein, Jessica Woodworth, Maurizio Zaccaro, Cecilia
Zanuso, Monica Zappelli, Giovanna Zapperi, Vojtěch Zavadil.
37th Torino Film Festival 937th TFF – opening and closing films
Opening film
Friday, November 22, Cinema Massimo, Turin
JOJO RABBIT by TAIKA WAITITI
starring
Roman Griffin Davis, Thomasin McKenzie, Scarlett Johansson, Sam Rockwell
Based on the novel Caging Skies by Christine Leunens, Waititi's new movie is a stinging and wrong-footing
satire about Nazism and its idols. It tells the story of a 10-year-old boy who lives in Vienna with his widowed
mother during the final years of Nazism. Jojo Betzler, a sweet and rather shy boy, has a chubby, bespectacled
best friend and they both want to become perfect members of the Hitler Youth. Jojo's idol is Adolf Hitler,
whom he has transformed into an imaginary friend and adviser.
Starring Waititi (as the imaginary Hitler), the very young Roman Griffin Davis, Scarlett Johansson (as Jojo's
mother), and Sam Rockwell (as the officer at the training camp for young Nazis), the movie won the People's
Choice Award at the 2019 Toronto Film Festival.
Jojo Rabbit will be released in Italian cinemas on January 23, 2020, distributed by 20th Century Fox Italia.
Closing film
Saturday, November 30, Cinema Reposi, Turin
KNIVES OUT by Rian Johnson
starring
Daniel Craig, Chris Evans, Ana de Armas, Jamie Lee Curtis, Toni Collette, Don Johnson, Michael Shannon,
Lakeith Stanfield, Katherine Langford, Jaeden Martell, Christopher Plummer
Daniel Craig sits enthroned in a large living room. He is the detective investigating the apparent suicide of
the rich author of detective stories who died just when his entire family had gathered to celebrate his 85th
birthday: everyone seems to have a motive for the crime. Jamie Lee Curtis, Christopher Plummer, Toni
Collette, Chris Evans, and many others wrestle with lies and silences in the detective story comedy created
by Rian Johnson (Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi), taking inspiration from Agatha Christie's whodunits.
Part Murder on the Orient Express and part Gosford Park.
Knives Out will be released in Italian cinemas on December 5, 2019, distributed by 01 Distribution.
37th Torino Film Festival 10TORINO 37 The most important competitive section of the festival, it is reserved to first, second, or third films and proposes 15 movies, unreleased in Italy. The countries represented are (in alphabetical order): Argentina, Canada, Chile, Denmark, France, Germany, Great Britain, Iceland, Italy, Qatar, Czech Republic, Russia, Singapore, Spain, United States, Sweden, Taiwan, Tunisia. The section focuses on “young” cinema, and the selection of the competing films aims at searching out and discovering innovative talents, which express the best trends of independent cinema. Over the years, the festival has awarded filmmakers at the start of their careers, such as: Tsai Ming-liang, David Gordon Green, Chen Kaige, Lisandro Alonso, Pietro Marcello, Debra Granik, Alessandro Piva, Pablo Larraín, Damien Chazelle. It is a cinema “of the future,” representing genres, languages, and trends. In 2018, Wildlife by Paul Dano (USA, 2018) won the award for Best Film. The actors Rainer Bock, for the film Atlas by David Nawrath (Germany, 2018) and Jakob Cedergren, for the film Den Skyldige / The Guilty by Gustav Möller (Denmark, 2018), received the award for Best Actor, ex-aequo. The actress Grace Passô won the award for Best Actress, for the film Temporada by André Novais Oliveira (Brazil, 2018); Atlas by David Nawrath (Germany, 2018) won the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo Award; Den Skyldige / The Guilty by Gustav Möller (Denmark, 2018) won the award for Best Screenplay. In 2018, the jury was chaired by Jia Zhangke (China) and was composed of Marta Donzelli (Italy), Miguel Gomes (Portugal), Col Needham (UK), Andreas Prochaska (Austria). ALGUNAS BESTIAS by Jorge Riquelme Serrano (Chile, 2019, DCP, 97’) Blocked on a small, isolated island after their assistant disappears with his boat, the latent and dormant tensions of three generations of a family explode due to isolation, stress, and hunger. Like a slightly more Latino and passionate Haneke, this Chilean first film is the elegant and merciless dissection of a family microcosm and its perversions, over which looms the figure of Alfredo Castro, the patriarch, in a more disquieting, unpleasant, and shocking role than usual. LE CHOC DU FUTUR by Marc Collin (France, 2019, DCP, 84’) Paris, 1978, a girl is trying to make a name for herself in the world of music by self-producing electronic music. Surrounded by synthesizers and futuristic equipment, Ana composes the music of the future, in conflict with a world which seems deaf to the sounds which are to come. The first film by Marc Collin (co- founder of the Nouvelle Vague), with a marvelous Eva Jodorowsky; an ethereal movie with an irresistible vintage atmosphere which will make you want to dance. DYLDA / BEANPOLE by Kantemir Balagov (Russia, 2019, DCP, 130’) Leningrad, 1945. Iya is a nurse at a hospital for war veterans. She is blond, very tall, shy, and every so often she is also blocked by a stress trauma. Masha was at the front and is much more worldly-wise than her friend, with whom she goes to live after returning from the front. A sidereal drama, perfectly directed, thereby confirming – after his debut film Tesnota at the TFF36 – the unique talent of Kantemir Balagov, born in 1991 and a pupil of Alexander Sokurov. FIN DE SIGLO by Lucio Castro (Argentina, 2019, DCP, 84’) Ocho and Javi meet in Barcelona. They like each other. And they discover that they had already met and liked each other 20 years earlier. A brief queer encounter over time, to discover that reality and the moment are only a question of perspective. An Argentine first film, full of discretion, in which the stars Juan Barberini and Ramon Pujol put themselves on the line with sensitivity. The sound track includes the unforgettable Space Age Love Song by A Flock of Seagulls. IL GRANDE PASSO by Antonio Padovan (Italy, 2019, DCP, 96’) It might seem like a crazy idea to construct a missile in a barn in order to get to the Moon. And in the small café in Polesine, Mario (Giuseppe Battiston) is considered more than the village idiot, he's the village dreamer. An anthropological UFO. One day, the brother he never knew, Dario (Stefano Fresi), appears: same father, different mothers. First, impatience and bickering; then, complicity. The second movie by the director of Finché c’è prosecco c’è speranza: all references to the poetics of Carlo Mazzacurati are on purpose. 37th Torino Film Festival 11
EL HOYO / THE PLATFORM by Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia (Spain, 2019, DCP, 90’) A man wakes up in a cell in the company of a copy of Don Quixote, and an elderly man in the next bed. He is in a vertical prison with two prisoners per floor. Once a day, a platform full of food is lowered: the higher you are the more you eat, and the lower the platform goes, the emptier it gets, leaving only crumbs. It won't be easy to survive and escape. Dystopian sci-fi which becomes Carpenter-like action: a quick-paced, political B-movie. HVÍTUR, HVÍTUR DAGUR / A WHITE, WHITE DAY by Hlynur Pálmason (Iceland/Denmark/Sweden, 2019, DCP, 109’) A car falls over a cliff. Inside is the wife of a policeman; much later, he is still trying to come to terms with his grief. And he obsessively continues to restructure the family house. The second film by Pálmason has a dramatic starting point – part private investigation, part existential crisis – and constructs a character who is a victim of his own rage. It reasons with depth and cruel irony on the reasons for rage, without hiding the pathological side of pain. MS. WHITE LIGHT by Paul Shoulberg (USA, 2019, DCP, 97’) Lex is a young woman with a special gift: she can empathize with people who are dying. This has become her job, which her father runs. Lex is unable to express this same sensitivity with the rest of the world, which terrorizes her. When a new client disputes her routine, things are destined to change. A bizarre American indie, funny and sweetly painful, starring Roberta Colindrez (I Love Dick, The Deuce) and Judith Light (Transparent). NOW IS EVERYTHING by Riccardo Spinotti and Valentina De Amicis (Italy/USA, 2019, DCP, 80’) A young fashion photographer. The death of a younger brother. His girlfriend's disappearance. These are the three prongs of the plot of the debut film by Valentina De Amicis and Riccardo Federico Spinotti (the son of Dante, who is the producer and cinematographer), a mysterious and almost experimental film which looks to Lynch and Malick as much as it does to certain aesthetics of art house video clips. The cast includes Ray Nicholson (the son of Jack), Anthony Hopkins, Madeline Brewer from The Handmaid’s Tale, and the beautiful and famous model, Camille Rowe. OHONG VILLAGE by Lungyin Lim (Taiwan/Czech Republic, 2019, DCP, 91’) Sheng–Ji returns to the area of Taiwan where he grew up: he was unable to make his fortune in the city but he pretends that his metropolitan adventure was a success. His return sparks clashes with his father, a humble oyster farmer, and feeds the ambition of a friend who dreams of a future far from the village. Shot in splendid 16mm, this debut film reflects on greed, false expectations, the poisoned myth of success, pride in one's work, and economic uncertainty. PINK WALL by Tom Cullen (UK, 2019, DCP, 85’) Jenna and Leon. Six years of life together, recounted through six moments in their relationship, one per year: from when they first met, to their life together, to their first misunderstandings. Tom Cullen (Downton Abbey, Knightfall) debuts as a director with an intimate movie with a painstaking script and two amazingly sensitive actors. A movie about the difficulties of life as a couple, constructed through fragments, in which emotions and jolts always return to the state of grace of that first meeting. PRÉLUDE by Sabrina Sarabi (Germany, 2019, DCP, 95’) A young pianist, a prestigious conservatory, the sacredness of rehearsals and study, absolute – almost mystical – dedication to music, the icy rigor of the teachers. The dream of winning a scholarship to the legendary Juilliard School wavers when a girl arrives and upsets David's fragile equilibrium. The heir to the German tradition of romantic tales, the portrait of an adolescence made of turmoil and tempest, urges and passions. RAF by Harry Cepka (Canada/USA, 2019, DCP, 91’) Raf lives in a basement apartment in Vancouver; she is eccentric and broke; she lets herself be carried passively along on the flow of life. Then she meets Tal: not only is she rich, she is also energetic and stubborn and life seems to have her solidly in hand. Written and directed by the debut filmmaker Harry Cepka, it eccentrically re-elaborates the canons of weird indie, with originality and innovative energy. The protagonist Grace Glowicki is like a combination of the actress Greta Gerwig, Buster Keaton, and Denis Lavant. 37th Torino Film Festival 12
LE RÊVE DE NOURA by Hinde Boujemaa (Tunisia/France/Qatar, 2019, DCP, 90’) Noura has three children, a husband in prison, and a lover with whom she is madly in love. She would like a divorce but when her husband is released from prison ahead of time, the woman is forced to take him back in order to avoid being persecuted as an adulteress by the harsh Tunisian law. A powerful second film, the portrait of a strong and passionate woman, as the director follows her along the difficult pathway of emancipation in a deeply repressive society. WET SEASON by Anthony Chen (Singapore/Taiwan, 2019, DCP, 103’) A young woman who teaches Chinese at a high school in Singapore befriends a student, the only one who is interested in her subject. The teacher wishes she had a child: for eight years, she has been unsuccessfully trying to get pregnant and, by now, all tenderness and complicity in her marriage have waned. The second film by Anthony Chen (Caméra d’Or in 2013 for Ilo Ilo) discreetly observes his characters as he accompanies their emotions and their efforts to free themselves from solitude during the monsoon season. 37th Torino Film Festival 13
FESTA MOBILE A comedy and a thriller, both unique: the Festa Mobile section opens with Jojo Rabbit, Taika Waititi's caustic and disorienting take on Nazism and its legends, and it ends with Knives Out by Rian Johnson, in which the seemingly benevolent investigation conducted by detective Daniel Craig keeps in check a wealthy, quarrelsome family whose patriarch has been assassinated. And it weaves its way among personal and collective events, the spirit and the history of countries and eras, icons, legends, genres. Couples in flight. A salesman and a female lawyer, both Afro-Americans, get caught up in a shootout on their first date and are forced to flee across the United States, in Queen & Slim, the feisty debut film by Melina Matsoukas, the acclaimed director of musical videos. A beautiful bank robber (Margot Robbie) and a young farmer dream of Mexico and hide out in Depression-era America, in Dreamland by Miles Joris- Peyrafitte. And two kids who are best friends shake off the suburban boredom of 1990s England and run away from home to go to a Rave, in the rousing Beats by Brian Welsh. Couples in black in three different thrillers: Ben Kingsley is a Mossad veteran on one final mission and enthralled by the femme fatale Monica Bellucci, in the spy movie Spider in the Web by Eran Riklis. Another femme fatale teaches a Romanian policeman an odd language made of whistles which he intends to use when he commits a crime, in the ironical noir La Gomera by Corneliu Porumboiu. Ian McKellen, a mature con man and a talented seducer of elderly women, entraps the rich widow Helen Mirren, without realizing that the lady is anything but gullible, in the thriller The Good Liar by Bill Condon. Wrong couples. A young, small-town substitute teacher and her husband, and the couple she forms with the high school student she seduces, with disastrous consequences, in Frances Ferguson, a provocative comedy by Bob Biyngton. The way we were. Spain, the summer of 1936, when the dean of the University of Salamanca, the author Miguel de Unamuno, publicly supports Generalissimo Franco, only to then repent having done so, in the solid fresco by Alejandro Amenábar Mientras dure la guerra. Italy, during the early 1970s, from the Piazza Fontana massacre on December 12, 1969 to terrorism, through the eyes of the directors who recounted those years, in Colpiti al cuore by Alessandro Bignami. New York in the '70s, in the enthralling story of the owner of a red-light movie house near Times Square, in The Projectionist by Abel Ferrara, who is also participating at the festival with Tommaso, in which his alter ego Willem Dafoe retraces the stages of his life in Rome, as it navigates family sayings, work problems, and longstanding fears. Two icons. Frida Kahlo, not just an artist but a very popular symbol of the tormented female condition, who wakes up, won't adapt, fights, narrated by Asia Argento in Frida viva la vida by Giovanni Troilo. Ned Kelly, the outlaw whose gang plundered Australia and fought the English during the late 1800s, becoming a sort of local Jesse James, is described with cruel and hallucinatory touches, from his childhood to his final deeds, in True History of the Kelly Gang by Justin Kurzel. Italian stories. Family stories, bittersweet, like Magari by Ginevra Elkann, the sentimental education of three children whose parents are divorced, during a bizarre Christmas in the 1980s (with Riccardo Scamarcio and Alba Rorwacher); or stories of friendships, surreal like Lontano lontano by Gianni Di Gregorio, who is one of three retired men in Rome who decide to go live someplace exotic where the cost of living is cheaper (the other two are Giorgio Colangeli and, in his final performance, Ennio Fantastichini); or tender, like Easy Living by Orso and Peter Miyakawa (produced with the support of the FCTP), four young people's improvised journey across the border at Ventimiglia to help an immigrant who is their same age. Stories of uncontrollable vocations, like Simple Women by Chiara Malta, in which the director Jasmine Trinca is inspired by Hal Hartley's Simple Men, or those which put the vocation of directors and technicians to the test, like L’Ultimo piano, a film made by the new graduates of the “Gian Maria Volonté” Film School, directed by Daniele Vicari. And stories that must be told and not forgotten, like the story of Nour, the young Syrian girl who landed alone on Lampedusa and who is cared for by Dr. Piero Bartolo (Sergio Castellitto), in the new movie by Maurizio Zaccaro. Lastly, a story through images that regards us all, the one drawn over the space of forty years with passion and irony by Marco Tullio Altan, in Mi chiamo Altan e faccio vignette by Stefano Consiglio. Magic of science. To recount, through cinema, what vaccines are, how they came about, what purpose they serve, why they are controversial: in Vaccini, 9 lezioni di scienza by Elisabetta Sgarbi, scientists, philosophers, and doctors use beautiful vintage toys to talk about a delicate topic. To study the sky in order to live better on earth: this is what scientists do at three astronomical observatories in Chile, South Africa, 37th Torino Film Festival 14
and the Canary Islands, with the people who live and work around them, in the fascinating Star Stuff by Milad Tangshir. Three restored classics. Il ladro di bambini, Gianni Amelio's “Journey to Italy,” from Milan to Sicily, in the company of his three young protagonists, in which anger and poetry, pain and serenity, interweave to describe Italy in the early 1990s (restored by Minerva Pictures). La grande strada azzurra: on the centenary of the birth of Gillo Pontecorvo, his debut in feature films, a thorny and realistic melodrama starring Yves Montand and Alida Valli (restored by the National Cinema Museum of Turin). Troppo tardi t'ho conosciuta, the story of a young tenor from a farming family and the seductress who entices him, the only movie, directed in 1939, by Emanuele Caracciolo, who became a partisan fighter and was shot at the Fosse Ardeatine; restored by the National Cinema Museum of Turin, the movie was re-discovered in 2003 by Lorenzo Ventavoli, who will receive this year's Maria Adriana Prolo Award. Solo tribute dedicated to Teona Strugar Mitevska The author exists; her name is Teona. A girl wearing an improbable fur coat dives into the icy waters of a river to retrieve a cross which the pope has thrown into the water during a religious ceremony. Whoever retrieves the cross is guaranteed a year of good luck. The girl surfaces clutching the trophy. Too bad the ritualistic competition is strictly reserved to the town's menfolk, and that almost the entire community rebels against the “heretical” female winner, and that she herself (unemployed, despite her intelligence and history degree) stubbornly refuses to give back the cross. It is hers, and it will give her a year of good fortune (and a long night of threats and insults, despite police protection). The story of God Exists, Her Name is Petrunija is one of those which struck a chord at the last Berlinale, where the movie was presented in competition: thanks to its energy and the provocative and surreal tone with which it deals with the question of women and the obstacles, discrimination, and traditions against which women are destined to clash, still today, even in the heart of Europe. Teona Strugar Mitevska, the movie's director, lives and works in Macedonia and she is one of the most promising and dynamic figures on the contemporary filmmaking scene. She was born in Skopje and graduated in film from the Tisch School of Arts in New York; she writes and produces her own movies, along with her sister Labina and her brother Vuk, with whom she founded the production company Sisters and Brother Mitevski. God Exists, Her Name is Petrunija is the most recent of her five feature films, which the Torino Film Festival presents (all as Italian premieres) in its solo tribute dedicated to the young filmmaker. Their stories are inspired by her land and by the contradictions and intolerance of the young people who live there, but they are actually also a good reflection of the distress, dreams, and disappointments of the contemporary world: the oppressed Macedonian family in How I Killed a Saint; the three, very different and starry-eyed sisters in I Am from Titov Veles; the two tormented and threatened mothers in The Woman Who Brushed Off Her Tears; the adolescents throwing their lives away on the outskirts of Skopje in When the Day Had No Name: her characters – natural, real, ordinary – always manage to transform themselves into symbols of our dissatisfaction, our ambitions, and our often fruitless search for ways out. To go into the city, to travel abroad, to return home, to challenge death, or, like Petrunija, to rebel with sudden, creative inspiration against the stupidity of an unwritten norm and the prejudices of the world. Teona Strugar Mitevska's style is dazzling and intense; she uses colors like psychological brushstrokes; she can pass from collective, comic dialogues and situations to the detachment of cinéma vérité, from moments of agonizing melancholy to dry and disturbing glimpses of indifferent, daily boredom. She combines a clear-eyed gaze on the poverty and chaos of cities and places, with touches of magical realism. In the background, she never forgets the conditions, the obligations, and the absurdities of social, political, and cultural conventions. And even if the heart of her stories is often female, she can also dig deeply into the male psyche and insecurities, above all - but not only - those of adolescents. She charms us, she makes us smile, and she makes us think, with the consistency and immediacy of a true storyteller. Traveling with Mario Soldati A "Soldati Day," a whole day dedicated to the author, director, screenwriter, television writer, and traveler. The day will unfold in a succession of screenings and talks, starting at ?? on Monday, November 25 and lasting through the evening, in the Sala 3 of the Cinema Massimo, which last year was renamed the Sala Soldati. The day will recount his complex, complete figure as an author: besides three of his greatest movies (Malombra, Fuga in Francia, and La provinciale), there will also be screenings of clips and episodes from his TV series, his news investigations, and his interviews. It starts with an episode of Viaggio nella valle del Po alla ricerca di cibi genuini, the TV series from 1957 in which Soldati basically invented culinary television, combined with the spin-off Pranzo di Natale, in which the author asks non-Roman friends about their Christmas food traditions, and the montage prepared by RaiMovie which celebrates the popularity of Soldati's TV persona. Then, two episodes of the irresistible series Chi legge? (another trip, from south to 37th Torino Film Festival 15
north, asking Italians, some of whom were still illiterate, about their reading preferences) and the beautiful
documentary Un'ora con Mario Soldati, in which the author talks about himself: memories, friendships, and
favorite places.
The screenings will alternate with talks by family members, friends, scholars, and representatives of the
world of culture, all of whom will share their memories of the author.
The Day is organized in collaboration with Rai Teche and the University of Turin's DAMS, at whose main
campus a study conference about the author will be held the next day, and with the University La Sapienza
of Rome, where another session of the conference will be held, almost as though to reestablish the
“autobiographical tie” between Turin and Rome which Soldati described in one of his most beautiful novels,
“The Two Cities.”
(Emanuela Martini)
BEATS
by Brian Welsh (UK, 2019, DCP, 101’)
Music is the fuel, the distilled gasoline for this overwhelming coming-of-age story. Based on a play, but not
theatrical cinema. Scotland, 1994, two young men who are best friends, almost “brothers,” hope to escape
their boring existence through the rave revolution. In lovely black and white, a movie about the rapid and
dizzying transformations in customs and musical habits. A political movie without nostalgia. Against the
Labour Party member Tony Blair and the conservative party. Hit and sunk by the beats.
COLPITI AL CUORE
by Alessandro Bignami (Italy, 2019, DCP, 50’)
Fifty years after the Piazza Fontana massacre, the story of the years which changed us forever, seen through
the eyes of those who were, and are, capable of capturing and interpreting the mood of the times with a
movie camera. Gianni Amelio, Marco Bellocchio, Renato De Maria, Marco Tullio Giordana, and Wilma Labate
recount that season in their films. While the historian Giovanni De Luna reveals the drama and the
contradictions. With a reminiscence of Giuseppe Genna.
DREAMLAND
by Miles Joris-Peyrafitte (USA, 2019, DCP, 98’)
There is a $10,000 reward for Allison Wells, a beautiful outlaw who robbed and, maybe, killed people during
the Depression. But when young Eugene finds her wounded in the family factory's barn, instead of turning
her in he takes care of her and dreams of running away with her. Produced by and starring the splendid Margot
Robbie, a story about love and flight which recalls the early Malick and Gangster Story by Penn, in a dusty,
wretched Texas where dreams die fast.
FRANCES FERGUSON
by Bob Byington (USA, 2019, DCP, 74’)
A young substitute teacher, who is unhappily married, thoughtlessly sleeps with a student at the high school
where she teaches. But it's impossible to keep a secret in the small Nebraska town where she lives and the
woman is soon arrested and forced to undergo social re-education. An elliptical, surprising, and original
movie which continuously changes paths, imbued with provocative humor; morally fluid and starring the
surprising Kaley Wheless.
FRIDA VIVA LA VIDA
by Giovanni Troilo (Italy, 2019, DCP, 90’)
A docufilm by Giovanni Troilo about Frida Kahlo: a journey in six chapters to the heart of Mexico, with
interviews, reenactments, works of art, and documents from the era, to recount the painter's passionate
ties with her land of birth, the physical pain which tormented her and which she sublimated in her painting,
37th Torino Film Festival 16her commitment to the feminist cause, and the deep cultural influence she had, which went well beyond the world of art. As colorful as Frida and narrated by Asia Argento with empathy. THE GOOD LIAR by Bill Condon (USA, 2019, DCP, 109’) Helen Mirren vs Ian McKellen, in a film with many field inversions, narrative twists, and surprises. Roy is a skillful and experienced swindler who intends to steal Betty's money. She is a wealthy widow who might be less gullible than she looks. Which one is the cat and which one is the mouse? Which one can tell better lies? Two extraordinary actors, for the first time together on the silver screen, in a thriller based on the novel by Searle. The duel between the actors ends in a tie. But what about the one between the characters they play? LA GRANDE STRADA AZZURRA by Gillo Pontecorvo (Italy, 1957, DCP, 105’) On the centenary of the birth of Gillo Pontecorvo, his first movie, based on the short novel Squarciò by Franco Solinas (who also wrote the screenplay, with the director and Ennio De Concini). On the archipelago of the island of La Maddalena, a gruff, solitary, stern, and stubborn fisherman fishes illegally using dynamite and is on bad terms with the rest of the community. Starring Yves Montand, Alida Valli, and a very young Mario Girotti, a harsh drama which reflects the lessons of neorealism. Restored by National Cinema Museum in collaboration with Compass Film. JOJO RABBIT by Taika Waititi (USA/Germany, 2019, DCP, 108’) 1945, ten-year-old Jojo lives in Vienna with his mother: he is a sweet and rather timid boy who would like to become a perfect young Nazi. In fact, his idol is Adolf Hitler, whom he has transformed into an imaginary friend. Taika Waititi (who came to the 2014 TFF with What We Do in the Shadows) directs and acts (Hitler) in a stinging and wrong-footing satire about Nazism and its myths, in which pain blends with pranks. Also starring the very young Roman Griffin Davis, Scarlett Johansson, and Sam Rockwell. Beatles music is in the air. For laughing and reflecting. KNIVES OUT by Rian Johnson (USA, 2019, DCP, 130’) Daniel Craig sits enthroned in a large living room. He is the detective investigating the apparent suicide of the rich author of detective stories who died just when his entire family had gathered to celebrate his 85th birthday: everyone seems to have a motive for the crime. Jamie Lee Curtis, Christopher Plummer, Toni Collette, Chris Evans, and many others wrestle with lies and silences in the detective story comedy created by Rian Johnson (Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi), taking inspiration from Agatha Christie's whodunits. Part Murder on the Orient Express and part Gosford Park. LA GOMERA / THE WHISTLERS by Corneliu Porumboiu (Romania/France/Germany/Sweden, 2019, DCP, 97’) A corrupt Romanian policeman is in a big mess; he travels to a small island in the Canaries (the one in the title) in the company of a femme fatale to learn a strange language made of whistles which he intends to use as a code during a crime. The craftiest and most ironical director of the Romanian Nouvelle Vague creates a surreal, noir, and melodramatic comedy with masterly disenchantment, framing his story with music that ranges from The Passenger to the Radetzky March. IL LADRO DI BAMBINI by Gianni Amelio (Italy/France/Switzerland/Germany, 1992, DCP, 114’) One of Gianni Amelio's masterpieces. The director, along with the Carabiniere Antonio (Lo Verso), and young Rosetta and Luciano, who were taken away from their mother and must be accompanied to an institute, takes a personal "journey to Italy" by train: from Milan to Sicily, in the early 1990s. A political and sentimental journey through the country, a social and moral context, a landscape, filtered through the relationship between the three protagonists. Hurt but not humiliated. Uprooted but full of an ancient and dignified compassion. Restored by Minerva Pictures. 37th Torino Film Festival 17
LONTANO LONTANO by Gianni Di Gregorio (Italy, 2019, DCP, 92’) It's never too late to make a change in your life. Attilio, Giorgetto, and the "Professore," three retired men from Rome, are tired of their daily struggle; they dream of escaping to someplace exotic. They begin to save up the necessary money but it's hard to break their habits. Di Gregorio continues his story of harmlessly eccentric men. With him, Giorgio Colangeli and Ennio Fantastichini in his last, very dynamic performance. MAGARI by Ginevra Elkann (Italy, 2019, DCP, 104’) The 1980s.: Alma, Jean, and Sebastiano, who live in Paris with their mother and her new husband, have to spend a compulsory vacation with their screenwriter father – who is a ladies' man suffering from writer's block - and his assistant/girlfriend. The trip brings their relationship into question, sparking tension and revealing the protagonists' soul. The directorial debut of Ginevra Elkann: a "family sayings" with autobiographical overtones, funny, sweet, and moving, starring Riccardo Scamarcio and Alba Rohrwacher. MI CHIAMO ALTAN E FACCIO VIGNETTE by Stefano Consiglio (Italy, 2019, DCP, 75’) To recount Altan means to recount forty years of Italian history: through Pimpa; his languid, blue-haired women; his umbrella-wielding men; and above all, his immovable, disarmed, and disarming Communist metalworker, Cipputi, he has traced the changes (or perhaps the immobility) of Italy and helped us navigate an absurd world with ironic detachment (or perhaps philosophical resignation). Alongside his drawings, he is recounted by colleagues and friends. MIENTRAS DURE LA GUERRA by Alejandro Amenábar (Spain/Argentina, 2019, DCP, 107’) Spain, the summer of 1936. The famous author Miguel de Unamuno, the dean of the University of Salamanca, publicly supports the anti-Republican coup. Then, as the civil war intensifies and some of his colleagues are imprisoned, the intellectual is forced to question his position. And he asks for a direct confrontation with Generalissimo Francisco Franco. Amenábar looks at the darkest page in Spanish history through the portrait of a person who was as controversial as he was fascinating. NOUR by Maurizio Zaccaro (Italy, 2019, DCP, 93’) Lampedusa is the landing but not the definitive destination of migrants fleeing war, violence, and hunger. A film constructed on the island: the emergency room where Pietro Bartolo (Castellitto) takes care of the refugees, the dock where the rust bucket boats touch land, a home-made radio, the refugee center. This is where Nour arrives, alone and frightened; she is a Syrian girl who has lost her father, who was killed, and her mother, who didn't board the boat with her. Moving and harsh, one of the many "private" stories we must not ignore. THE PROJECTIONIST by Abel Ferrara (USA/Greece, 2019, DCP, 81’) Ferrara returns to the “bad old days” of New York, Times Square, the ‘70s. When the city and the cinemas hadn't been anesthetized yet by the new owners of the business. On this journey through cinematographic and urban memory, his Virgil is Nicolas Nicolaou, originally from Cyprus, who for fifty years has dedicated his life, in various capacities, to films and their stories. A passionate eulogy of film mania and those who still want to sit in a cinema and look at a screen. The silver one. QUEEN & SLIM by Melina Matsoukas (USA, 2019, DCP, 127’) The first date between a salesman (Daniel Kaluuya, Get Out) and a female lawyer (Jodie Turner-Smith) would have ended there if, after being stopped at night for a minor traffic violation, they hadn't killed the policeman in legitimate defense. They flee through the States, abetted and hidden by the Afro-American community. The video of the shootout goes viral and, against their will, the two become a symbol of disquiet and fear. “On the road” in a marginal, beautiful, and terrible America. 37th Torino Film Festival 18
SIMPLE WOMEN by Chiara Malta (Italy/Romania, 2019, DCP, 85’) As an adolescent, Federica (Jasmine Trinca) had been dazzled when she saw Simple Men by Hal Hartley, and by the character played by Elina Löwensohn, who, like her, suffered from epilepsy. Years later, after becoming a director, she meets Elina and offers to make a movie about her life, from her childhood in the Romania of Ceausescu to her success in America. A love letter to cinema, which studies the substance which makes the myth and the struggle to grow up, which is a part of every age. SPIDER IN THE WEB by Eran Riklis (UK/Israel, 2019, DCP, 111’) Ben Kingsley is a veteran of Mossad; he moves between Belgium and Holland. The upper echelons of Israeli intelligence don't trust him anymore and they send a young agent, the son of an old colleague of his, to check up on him. Monica Bellucci as a femme fatale gets into the game. Eran Riklis from The Syrian Bride and The Lemon Tree makes a painful and romantic spy movie which is anything but static and which clearly refers to the model of John Le Carré and his Smiley. STAR STUFF by Milad Tangshir (Italy, 2019, DCP, 80’) Chile, South Africa, the Canary Islands. Three different continents, three villages, three very old communities, and three astronomical observatories. A journey to discover the different ways people can observe the cosmos and, through this observation, research and science, as well - but also the passion and the dream of re-positioning ourselves in the universe. Produced by Davide Ferrario and Francesca Bocca, a fascinating documentary with a cosmic and compassionate approach which reminds us how important it is to "look at the stars." TOMMASO by Abel Ferrara (Italy/UK/USA/Greece, 2019, DCP, 115’) After recounting Rome's Esquilino district in Piazza Vittorio, Abel Ferrara sets an autobiographical film in the same neighborhood, where his alter ego Willem Dafoe is a director who has to deal with his wife's jealousy, his anxiety that something might happen to his young daughter, and his fear of slipping back into drug addiction and alcoholism. Between mystical obsessions and work problems, a film which Ferrara calls a "reflection" on his actual life. Dafoe's wife and daughter are played by the director's real wife and daughter. TRUE HISTORY OF THE KELLY GANG by Justin Kurzel (Australia, 2019, DCP, 124’) Ned Kelly is a legend of Australia's counterculture, a sort of Jesse James who plundered the country and clashed with the British army. The story of the young bandit (George McKay), his miserable childhood poisoned by his strong and fierce mother, his apprenticeship with an elderly crook (Russell Crowe), his legendary gang (they dressed in drag to rob people), the film unwinds among huts and brothels, abuse and memories, against the background of an arid and hallucinatory outback. L’ULTIMO PIANO by the “G.M. Volonté” Film School (Italy, 2019, DCP, 87’) An apartment for out-of-town students in Rome's Tor Marancia neighborhood: the intertwining lives of three young men and an older, former punk bass player. The debut feature film by nine directors, with the collaboration of scriptwriters, film editors, cinematographers, all newly graduated from the “Gian Maria Volonté” Film School: under the guidance of the school's director, Daniele Vicari, they try their hand at an innovative experiment. VACCINI. 9 LEZIONI DI SCIENZA by Elisabetta Sgarbi (Italy, 2019, DCP, 60’) Linear, lucid, illuminating, a historical and educational story of vaccines: how they came about, what they are, why they are a topic of discussion. With the help of beautiful vintage toys, scientists such as Chiara Azzari, Roberto Burioni , and Alberto Mantovani; doctors such as Pietro Bartolo, Andrea Biondi , and 37th Torino Film Festival 19
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