– The festival returns from 4-9 June under the artistic direction of Claudio Santamaria, with over 120 films and guests, including Julian Schnabel, Valeria Golino and Dario Argento
Vittorio De Sica – La vita in scena by Francesco Zippel
Milano Film Fest returns for its second edition, running from 4-9 June, featuring over 120 films, with two international competitions for features and shorts, sneak peeks of upcoming TV series, numerous guests, and industry-focused panels and talks. Officially opening the programme will be the documentary Vittorio De Sica – La vita in scena by Francesco Zippel (distributed in Italy by Fandango). The only Italian title at the 79th Cannes Film Festival (shown in the Cannes Classics section), the documentary retraces the life, work and legacy of one of the greatest masters of world cinema through previously unseen archive materials, the voices of the De Sica family, and testimonies from international artists and filmmakers such as Wes Anderson (also an executive producer), Isabella Rossellini and Francis Ford Coppola.
For the artistic director, actor Claudio Santamaria, “The festival is not just a line-up of premieres; it is a living laboratory and a meeting place for international perspectives, and for many colleagues and auteurs from the contemporary Italian scene. This is what a festival should do: shorten distances, allow the audience to look the masters in the eye and understand how magic is born. We have sought out courageous cinema that forces you to think.” Among the most eagerly awaited guests are director and artist Julian Schnabel, who will present his latest film, In the Hand of Dante, and take part in a conversation with the audience together with Valeria Golino, plus horror maestro Dario Argento, who has announced a new thriller set in Paris and starring Isabelle Huppert.
Ten international features are competing for the Best Film Award, to be weighed up by a jury presided over by Valeria Bruni Tedeschi. There is To the Victory! by Valentin Vasyanovych, one of the most important contemporary Ukrainian directors, which won an award at Toronto. Portuguese filmmaker Ivo M Ferreira is present with Projecto Global, which world-premiered at IFFR, about an armed group living underground in 1980s Lisbon. From Germany, Thanks for Nothing by Stella Marie Markert (selected at SXSW) centres on four girls teetering between adolescence and adulthood, while from France comes The Wonderers, the debut feature by Joséphine Japy starring Mélanie Laurent, presented as a Special Screening at Cannes last year and focusing on a family grappling with a hard-to-accept illness. From Paraguay comes Narciso by Marcelo Martinessi, set in the late 1950s, during the dictatorship, and rewarded at the latest Berlinale in the Panorama section. Another political title is the Taiwanese film Before the Bright Day by Tsao Shih-han (New Directors section at San Sebastián), while the feature debut by Jordanian director Zain Duraie, Sink, is a family drama led by actress Clara Khoury (The Voice of Hind Rajab), which bowed at Toronto. Meanwhile, in the Tunisian effort Where the Wind Comes From by Amel Guellaty (premiered at Sundance), the friendship between two boys will be sorely tested by a journey. The USA is represented by Fantasy Life by Matthew Shear and Keep Quiet by Vincent Grashaw.
Controcampo, the out-of-competition section, hosts five titles. Two are Italian debut features: Spacetime Chronicles by Stefano Bertelli, a stop-motion animation that will also be the only Italian flick in competition at the next Annecy Festival, and Tranquility Base by Lorenzo Pedrotti, starring Fabrizio Ferracane as a man investigating an alien abduction. Science fiction also takes centre stage in Crocodile by Pietra Brettkelly and in The Critics, a New Zealand-Nigerian co-production shot over 13 years in an immersive, hybrid style (the film counts Idris Elba among its executive producers). Finally, Redoubt by John Skoog, presented in the New Directors section at San Sebastián, is a Swedish tale set at the height of the Cold War, and closing proceedings will be the Chinese title West Border by Yan Luo.
(Translated from Italian)
