Italian films and Canadian shorts

Annual movie festival to feature new and old material emphasizing Italy's regional make-up

The sixth annual Toronto Italian Film Festival takes place in the city June 9 to 13, and the line-up features a total of 10 features and 11 shorts.
"Emphasis this year is on the regional aspect," says Carlo Coen, director of the Istituto Italiano di Cultura which is sponsoring the event. "I like to call it the regional reality."
Coen spoke at a press conference for the festival held earlier this week. The conference, presided upon by Coen, Italian Consul to Toronto Luca Brofferio, Honorary Festival Chairman Dan Iannuzzi and programmer Frank Caruso, announced a special award to Italian-Canadian filmmaker Jerry Ciccoritti for his contribution to Canadian cinema.
Opening the festival on June 9 is Mimmo Mongelli's The House of Women. The 2003 film is set in 1919 in the countryside surrounding Bari, Apulia. From a man and his three concubines a complicated family is formed, in which paternity and maternity is occasionally uncertain. Twenty years later, the eldest of the group weds and flees to Bari. The rest of the relatives move into the same building. Furthermore, the "tribe" expands with the addition of the in-laws of the first-born. Due to a combination of historical, personal and violent events, the family situation changes, endangering their entire existence. The movies stars Anna Gigante, Ivana Pantaleo, Toto Onnis, and Antonella Chilorio.
Another feature is Enzo Monteleone's 2002 movie, El Alamein. At El Alamein the Italo-German army is blocked and forced to retreat. Alongside the Germans against the English, there are also Italians, that make up a badly armed but valiant army, totally abandoned unto themselves, but proud and capable of heroic acts against a much stronger enemy and an ally that despises them. The Ariete, Trieste, Pavia and Brescia divisions, the paratroopers of Folgore, the 31st battalion of Genio carried out their duty to the full, despite enormous difficulties, with soldiers in the front lines, fighting against dysentery and thirst, in impossible conditions, in a hostile environment, where men are fighting daily for their survival. The film stars Pier Francesco Favino, Emilio Solfrizzi, Paolo Briguglia, Thomas Trabacchi and Silvio Orlando.
Alberto Negrin's 2002 feature Perlasca, An Italian Hero has been screened several times here already, but if you haven't seen the movie it shows June 10 during the festival. Giorgio Perlasca managed to save more than 5,000 Hungarian Jews by passing himself off as a Spanish Ambassador. An Italian fascist during the Spanish Civil War, he happened to be in Hungary during the Nazi persecution of Jews in Budapest. Shocked by what he saw, he decided to remain and use his "fascist credentials" to fool the authorities into believing he was the Spanish Ambassador. In this disguise, with the help and cover of the Spanish Embassy, Perlasca displayed extraordinary courage and energy in tricking the Nazis, snatching the Jews from the death trains and even foiling a last-minute plan to burn down the Budapest ghetto along with its inhabitants. Film stars Luca Zingaretti and Giuliana Lojodice.
Alessandro Piva's 2003 movie, My Brother-In-Law is set in modern-day Bari. Toni and Vito are brothers-in-law. They differ on every issue, and obviously do not get along at all. Toni is a worldly 40-year-old businessman, while Vito, who's married to Toni's sister, is slightly younger, an ordinary clerk who leads a very ordinary life. Vito attends the baptism of Toni's son with his wife Anna, when his brand-new car is stolen. With the baptism celebration in jeopardy and following his sister's prompting, a reluctant Toni offers to help his brother-in-law search for the car. The two men then begin their search in Toni's high-powered vehicle, through various metropolitan landscapes, in a night that seems endless. Throughout the night, shoulder to shoulder, the two brothers-in-law learn to trust each other a bit more, and by dawn, the pair end up walking virtually at the same pace. Film stars Sergio Rubino and Luigi Lo Cascio.
Giovanni Columbu's Archipelaghi was also screened in Toronto recently. The 2000 movie centres on a boy of 14 who is on trial at the Nuoro courthouse in Sardinia accused of murder. As the case unfolds we relive, through the nightmares of the boy, a more disturbing crime. The previous year, the boy's younger brother, Giosuè, was left in a farmhouse for a few hours on his own, where he witnessed the theft of livestock. The thieves, convinced that Giosuè had ratted on them decide to teach the boy "a lesson" and inadvertently end up killing the youngster. Fast forward to the courthouse where there begins to emerge a completely different account of what happened.
Renzo Badolisani's A Glimpse of Yesterday is also a four-year-old movie that centres on a teenage boy, one uprooted from his northern Italian home and sent to live with an aunt in Locride, the most impoverished area of Calabria. Young Stefano's original rejection of what he considers a primitive world dominated by family feuds gradually gives way to an empathetic understanding of the ways of this archaic society and an appreciation for its beauties and the friendships he finds there. His metamorphose is so complete that he becomes entangled in an event which leaves a wound that is not healed until his "return" as an adult.
Tonino Zangardi's 2002 film Take Me Away stars Valeria Golino in a story about 13-year-old Romana, a gypsy in the same class at school as Giampiero who lives with his parents, Alfredo and Luciana. Luciana paints, and is unhappy with her life; Alfredo has a fruit and vegetable shop; Otello spends his day selling soft drinks in the streets; Italo has a bar and acts as a "spiritual guide" to the area. One day, Otello is selling drinks in the gypsy camp when he realizes that he has been robbed. Out of revenge, he accuses Romana of the theft. And so a 'war' breaks out between the gypsies and the inhabitants of the area, which leads to the torching of the camp. None of this has much effect on the relationship between Giampiero and Romana until her alcoholic father 'loses' her in a card game with Fulberto, an old gypsy. When Fulberto comes to get Romana, she is with Giampiero who tries in vain to defend her but is beaten up. This episode inflames the anger in the neighbourhood.
Carlo Luglio's 2002 Capo Nord tells the story of four young men from southern Italy dreaming of an easy way to get rich and decide to move to Germany. But the information they were given concerning the way to rob a rich family's villa proves to be erroneous. Their options are now limited to going back home or following the path of adventure. They find themselves in the Far North where they manoeuvre between attempted robbery and petty thieving, but soon understand that they are not cut out for that kind of job. A series of tragic and grotesque events will make them grow and force them to take on their first, real responsibilities.
Closing the festival is Claudio Bondi's 2001 movie, The Education of Giulio, about 18-year-old Giulio who is copying patients' case files at the City Royal Mental Institute for Women. This daily afternoon task has been entrusted to him by his father Ettore, the hospital's head financial officer. Ettore lives with his wife and children in one of the apartments in the hospital. His wish is to see Giulio follow in his professional footsteps. One day Giulio notices a young patient, Margherita, a girl of about 20. Giulio is at the stage in his life where he feels the need to come out of his shell and establish his personality but doesn't know how.
The shorts in the programme are all from Canadian filmmakers, and they include Fulvio Cecere's The Regular Guy, Nico Monteleone's Stranieri in Citta, Carlo Basilone's Hockey Night in Milan and Vittorio Rossi's Little Blood Brother.
The Toronto Italian Film Festival takes place at the Bloor Cinema from June 9 to 13. For more information call 416.657.0100.

Publication Date: 2004-06-06
Story Location: http://tandemnews.com/viewstory.php?storyid=4043