New Italian Cinema Celebrates 11 Years in San Francisco at Landmark's Embarcadero Center Cinema

Eight-Day Series Features In-Person Tribute to Francesca Comencini, Seven Feature Premieres from Emerging Italian Filmmakers, Seven New Shorts from First-Time Directors and the New Feature from Festival-Favorite Francesca Archibugi

October 12, 2007

San Francisco, CA — The San Francisco Film Society, the Italian Cultural Institute of San Francisco and New Italian Cinema Events of Florence, Italy, present New Italian Cinema (Nov 11–18, Landmark’s Embarcadero Center Cinema), an eight-day series dedicated to celebrating the rich cinematic tradition of Italy and bringing the country’s newest directors and films to audiences in San Francisco. The films in this year’s program range from riotous romantic comedies to taut political dramas, and investigate topics including fashion, finance, employment, family ties, desire, religion, ambition, illness and terrorism, which affect Italians from every walk of life. New Italian Cinema features a competitive series of seven feature films and seven shorts by emerging directors, a tribute to acclaimed director Francesca Comencini and the Closing Night screening of Flying Lessons, the newest film by the beloved director Francesca Archibugi.

The week of focus on Italian cinema launches with a three-film tribute to Francesca Comencini, one of Italy’s most socially concerned, impassioned and vital filmmakers, who will be in attendance.

“We are immensely excited to be presenting this series once again with our wonderful partners in Florence,” said Film Society programmer Rod Armstrong. “The 2008 edition of New Italian Cinema demonstrates that emerging Italian filmmakers are comfortable working within a variety of genres—comedy, suspense, coming-of-age—to tell their stories. Coupled with our stellar Opening and Closing Night, the program is sure to be memorable for Bay Area audiences.”

The New Italian Cinema Events (N.I.C.E.) organization in Florence oversaw the selection committee—Linda Blackaby, director of programming for the Film Society; journalists Deborah Young and Barbara Corsi; and Peter Scarlet, executive director of the Tribeca Film Festival—which chose the films to present in the 2007 New Italian Cinema competition. Journalist Anna di Martino curated the seven shorts in the program. All feature and short filmmakers are expected at the Embarcadero for Q&As with the audiences. The N.I.C.E. City of Florence Awards for Best Feature and Best Short will be decided by the combined audience ballots from San Francisco and New York, and announced at the Closing Night Award Ceremony on Sunday, November 18.

New Italian Cinema comes to a festive conclusion with a celebratory evening of films, awards, enticing Italian appetizers and complimentary beverages provided by Peroni Beer. The Closing Night film is Francesca Archibugi’s Flying Lessons, a moving coming-of-age tale about two young Roman students who travel to India. Immediately after the 5:15 screening there will be an onstage ceremony to present the coveted N.I.C.E. City of Florence Awards to the audience’s favorite feature and short. The City of Florence Awards Reception at 8:00 pm will offer Italian hors d’oeuvres and the opportunity to mingle with the visiting filmmakers.

Sunday, November 11 Opening Night
6:00 pm Our Country A casa nostra
dir. Francesca Comencini (in attendance)
As the financial focal point of Italy, Milan is Italy’s center of finance, fashion and glamour. It is also a city where money dominates every transaction, as Comencini’s powerful drama attests. From a businessman whose phone is being wiretapped to an ex-con trying to rescue a prostitute from the streets, Our Country presents gripping stories of greed and corruption played against the backdrop of a vibrant international metropolis. As the stories intersect and resolve, the lingering effect is a comprehensive portrait of a city in crisis. Comencini’s desire was to demonstrate that, “Italy has lost its moral compass;” with this film, she does so brilliantly. (106 min, 2006)
8:00 pm Opening Night Reception
9:00 pm Our Country see above

Monday, November 12 Francesca Comencini Tribute
6:45 pm I Like to Work (Mobbing) Mi piace lavorare (Mobbing)
Comencini’s intense workplace drama features a stunning turn by Nicoletta Braschi as Anna, a single mother with an ailing father who encounters further difficulties when the company where she works is taken over by a multinational. Soon she finds herself persona non grata in the office, taking her breaks alone and suffering under sidelong glances from coworkers. Constant stress and overwork render her less capable of fulfilling other responsibilities, leading to further tensions. To tell this powerful story of dirty office politics, Comencini cast real trade unionists, who came with their own stories and improvised many of the scenes. (89 min, 2004)

9:00 pm My Father’s Words Le parole di mio padre
The spoiled and somewhat shiftless thirtysomething Zeno (Fabrizio Rongione) is left reeling when his father dies. He is forced to get a job so he introduces himself to wealthy merchant Giovanni Malfenti (film director Mimmo Calopresti), the father of four lovely daughters. As the older man takes the younger under his wing and into his home, Zeno finds himself falling for the eldest daughter Ada (Chiara Mastroianni) while another daughter Alberta (Claudia Coli) also makes a play for him. Updating a section of Italo Svevo’s famous novel Zeno’s Conscience and placing it in present-day Rome, Comencini has made a timeless film about desire and family ties. (85 min, 2001)

Tuesday, November 13 City of Florence Competition Films
6:45 pm Salt Air L’aria salata
dir. Alessandro Angelini
An assured film, which tells the story of Fabio (Giorgio Pasotti), a guilt-ridden prison counselor given to angry outbursts, who discovers that his newest case happens to be his long-estranged father. At first keeping his identity a secret and barely withholding his contempt for the older man, Fabio gradually allows empathy and understanding to enter the relationship. By offering knowing details about Fabio’s other close relationships (predominantly with his sister and girlfriend) in addition to the central conflict, director Angelini offers an unsentimental, honest and touching film about the complicated yet vital father/son dynamic. (85 min, 2006)
Preceded by Guinea Pig (La cavia), dir. Antonello de Leo (17 min, 2007). A black woman decides to put herself through a scientific experiment in order to heal her sick child.

9:15 pm Any Reason Not to Marry? Il giorno+bello
dir. Massimo Cappelli
In this riotous romantic comedy, Leo (Fabio Troiano) and Nina (Violante Placido) are a perfectly happy and hip young couple, until they decide to get married. They initially decide on a simple wedding, free of religious trappings, parental conflicts and unnecessary presents, but are stymied at every turn. Nina starts caving in to tradition, forgoing sexual relations and removing her various piercings, while Leo begins to lament the impending loss of bachelorhood. Along the way to the altar, writer/director Cappelli uses different and clever techniques to satirize politics, religion, the challenges of the wedding registry and guest list and much more. (90 min, 2006)
Preceded by Scrambled (Uova), dir. Alessandro Celli (4 min, 2006) A young girl creates a unique refuge from her constantly fighting parents.

Wednesday, November 14 City of Florence Competition Films
6:45 pm The Ball Liscio
dir. Claudio Antonini
Having a single mother who sings in a nightclub and is a romantic free spirit is troubling and confusing for young Raul (Umberto Morelli) in this coming-of-age charmer. Rather than let her continue to make poor choices and have to fight his peers who criticize her lifestyle, the boy decides to set her up with the music teacher at his school. Cowriter and director Antonini is unafraid of showing the misguided, sometimes obnoxious side of kids and leavens his story with humanity and humor. As Raul’s independent and beautiful mother Monica, Laura Morante
(The Son’s Room) turns in another terrific performance. (80 min, 2006)
Preceded by Everyone Saved (Tana libera tutti), dir. Vito Calmieri (15 min, 2006). A vivacious young boy tries to get his neighbor, Flavia, to recognize him.

9:15 pm Me, the Other Io, l’altro
dir. Mohsen Melliti
Two friends come to blows when one suspects the other of being a terrorist in this gorgeously photographed, suspense-driven drama set entirely aboard a ship. Fishermen Giuseppe (Raoul Bova) and Yousef (Giovanni Martaorana) begin their trip bantering over musical tastes, religious differences and soccer teams. A radio broadcast, announcing a manhunt for someone with Yousef’s exact name, brings their joshing to a quick halt. While adeptly building tension, Melliti also shows the way that economic hardship and racial and religious differences feed suspicion and fear. By the film’s end, various secrets of both men are revealed as well as some uneasy truths about life in the post-9/11 era. (80 min, 2007)
Preceded by Supper at Emmaus (La cena di Emmaus), dir. José Corvaglia (11 min, 2005). A frantic depiction of a wide-ranging game of hide-and-seek.

Thursday, November 15 City of Florence Competition Films
6:45 pm One Out of Two Uno su due
dir. Eugenio Cappuccio
Eugenio Cappuccio (I Truly Respect You) returns to New Italian Cinema with an emotional drama about a cocksure, womanizing lawyer named Lorenzo (Fabio Volo) who is hospitalized with a mysterious ailment. He treats his best friend, his lover, and his roommate with anger and contempt, full of rage at being incapacitated and vulnerable. As he gradually finds reasons to live, he also finds a path towards a less selfish and arrogant existence. With scenes of the gorgeous Genoa skyline and shore including some terrific paragliding scenes, Cappuccio shows how unpleasant experiences can lead to personal transformation. (100 min, 2007)
Preceded by Carpa Diem, dir. Sergio Cannella (2 min, 2006). A young girl must save her beloved fish from the wasteful habits of her younger brother.

9:15 pm Italian Dream
dir. Sandro Baldoni
In this mystery-laden drama, a down-on-his-luck hotel clerk named Antonio is burdened by two kids and a suspicious wife and fantasizes about owning a restaurant in London. This desire becomes possible with the appearance of Raniero, a strange man who keeps popping up bearing lucrative gifts and useful betting tips, greatly improving Antonio’s material wealth. An ulterior motive is revealed, however, when Raniero demands that the aspiring restaurateur kill him but states that this deed might result in Antonio’s own death. As the hapless potential assassin moves inexorably toward his destiny, Baldoni nicely weaves suspense and romance into the constantly twisting storyline. (94 min, 2007)
Preceded by Good Night (Buonanotte), dir. Melo Prino (5 min, 2007). This sequel to last year’s Good Morning finds our hero struggling against nighttime difficulties.

Friday, November 16 City of Florence Competition Films
6:45 pm Shelter Riparo
dir. Marco Simon Puccioni
When Anna (Maria de Medeiros), a wealthy shoe heiress, and her lover Mara (Antonia Liskova) return from Tunisia, they find a teenager named Anis stowed away in their car trunk. The maternal Anna invites him home, thus introducing a powder keg of race, sexual politics, and class into their formerly bucolic life. As the boy becomes discomfited over the nature of the women’s relationship and turns to Mara for explanation and solace, Mara herself begins to chafe from the overly protective and materially dependent nature of their love. (100 min, 2007)
Preceded by Just Five Minutes (Solo cinque minuti), dir. Filippo Soldi (6 min, 2007). A wheelchair-bound journalist must negotiate five flights of stairs to interview the actress Valeria Golino.

9:15 pm The Ball see Nov. 14

Saturday, November 17 City of Florence Competition Films
2:00 pm One Out of Two see Nov. 15
4:30 pm Italian Dream see Nov. 15
7:00 pm Me, the Other see Nov. 14
9:15 pm Salt Air see Nov. 13

Sunday, November 18 Closing Night
12 noon Any Reason Not to Marry? See Nov. 13
2:30 pm Shelter see Nov. 16

5:15 pm Flying Lessons Lezioni di volo
dir. Francesca Archibugi
Pollo (Andrea Miglio Risi) and his best friend Curry (Tom Angel Kharumaty) are two teenagers from Rome who travel to India after failing their final exams. After a robbery renders them penniless and Pollo falls ill, they meet Chiara (Giovanna Mezzogiorno), an aid worker, who takes them to a desert village. In this remote locale, each of them learns or experiences something to take forward into their future lives. Using the backgrounds of the two boys—Pollo is Jewish and Curry is Indian—as guidepoints for these life lessons, this beautifully rendered drama manages to sensitively delineate cultural details while telling a moving coming-of-age tale. (106 min, 2007)
Preceded by Phaedra, dir. Salvo Bitonti (10 min, 2006), the story of the marriage of Phaedra and her desire for her son-in-law Hippolytus is told against the beautiful backdrop of present-day Stromboli; and Red Line, dir. Francesco Cannavà (14 min, 2007), on board a train, a man and a woman exchange meaningful glances. What will happen next?

8:00 pm City of Florence Awards Reception
9:15 pm Flying Lessons see above

Box office information: $11.00 general/$9.00 Film Society and Italian Cultural Institute members/$10.00 seniors, students and persons with disabilities; Opening Night Film & Reception or Closing Night Film & Reception –$18.00 general/$15.00 members; and CineVoucher 10-Pack – $100.00 general/$80.00 members). Box office opens October 15 for members and October 29 for the general public: online at www.sffs.org, by calling 925.866.9559 or by faxing 925.866.9597. For group sales call 415.561.5047 or email achin@sffs.org.

New Italian Cinema Events San Francisco is sponsored by Peroni Beer, BICA (Best of Italy Consumer Association) and Regione Siciliana, and presented with support from media partners San Francisco Magazine, SF Weekly and KDFC Classical 102.1 FM; venue sponsors Embarcadero Center and Landmark Theatres; and hotel sponsor Larkspur Hotels & Restaurants and jewelry sponsor Angela Caputi. Support for Opening and Closing Night receptions provided by Peroni Beer, Gallery One, Siena Imports and Fuzio Universal Bistro.