It’s June, so that means it’s time for Open Roads: New Italian Cinema 2013 at New York’s Lincoln Film Society. It’s a fantastic annual festival that brings some of the freshest voices in Italian Cinema, thus breaking the chain for the typical crop of old classics that some Italian cinema fests tend to focus on.… Continue reading Open Roads 2013: E’ stato il figlio – It was the Son (Daniele Cipri – 2012)
Tag: sicily
In nome della legge – In the Name of the Law (Pietro Germi – 1949)
New magistrate arrives, and old one departs It usually happens when a new guy, typically from the north, but in this case from the Sicilian capital, arrives to the wild South in effort to instill some law and order and the local backlash it creates. We have already seen this formula in action in many… Continue reading In nome della legge – In the Name of the Law (Pietro Germi – 1949)
Seduced and Abandoned – Sedotta e abbandonata (Pietro Germi – 1964)
When you think about what makes a film a masterpiece, beyond the usual suspects like clever script, believable acting or memorable soundtrack – what I believe worked extremely well for post-war Italian cinema is the historical context. For the neorealism genre it supplied ample stories of hardships told by non-professional actors in actual locations with… Continue reading Seduced and Abandoned – Sedotta e abbandonata (Pietro Germi – 1964)
N.I.C.E. Sicilian Short Films Contest – Taormina Film Festival
Just arrived yesterday to charming Taormina, aptly named because it’s perched royally on mount Tauro overlooking mount Etna. The town is not packed as I was initially afraid of but contains a healthy dose of tourists that happily savor the holy trinity: pasta-espresso-ice cream. I decided to kick off the festival with the short films… Continue reading N.I.C.E. Sicilian Short Films Contest – Taormina Film Festival
Kaos (Paolo and Vittorio Taviani -1984)
With a mysteriously enchanting soundtrack by Nicola Piovani and a black raven donned with a chiming bell flying over the timeless medieval villages perched defiantly on the mountains of Girgenti on the southern coast of Sicily – the brothers Taviani weave together five tales based on novels by 1934 Nobel prize in Literature laureate, Luigi… Continue reading Kaos (Paolo and Vittorio Taviani -1984)