26/09/2003

There are many low-budget Italian films, with a low to medium levels of prints being released in competition with the American blockbusters, the real dominators of the peak cinema season, like Matchstick Men by Ridley Scott and The Emperor’s club, starring Kevin Kline. There are 5 new Italian films out in cinemas from today (This week's european premieres): Amorfù by Emanuela Piovano, produced by Kitchen Film and distributed by Key Films: it’s a story of love and madness, starring two professional actors, Ignazio Oliva and Sonia Bergamasco, and a series of people with psychiatric illnesses.

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Per Sempre by Alessandro di Robillant, produced by Rodeo Drive and RAI Cinema and distributed by 01, marks the return of two old hands to the Italian cinematographic scene: the TV presenter and journalist Maurizio Costanzo, who wrote the screenplay, 25 years after his collaboration on the script for A Particular day by Ettore Scola, and the new performance by Francesca Neri, who stars alongside Giancarlo Giannini in a dramatic story where love attracts not only itself but also madness and death. Death is also featured in a violent and bloody form in Cattive Inclinazioni by Pierfrancesco Campanella. It’s the story of a long series of unsolved murders, almost all of which are carried out in the same apartment block and with the same type of weapon, a metal set square. This bizarre whodunit, produced by Bell Film together with Metropolis Film and starring an almost entirely female cast (Florinda Bolkan, Eva Robins, Mirca Viola, Elisabetta Cavallotti and Elisabetta Rocchetti), will be distributed from today in 30 prints by Columbia Tristar Italia.

Meanwhile the dramatic era of Fascism is the backdrop for the somewhat ambiguous comedy, Il compagno americano by Barbara Barni, starring the young Hugh O’ Connor, Giulio Base, Tosca D’Aquino and Nancy Brilli. It is produced by Metropolis Film, with vital funding provided by the Ministry. The film goes back to Cinecittà in the '30s and '40s, with Brilli playing the part of a diva linked to the regime, in a Fascist Italy that is soon to enter the war. Finally, out on release in Italy from today is At the First Breath of Wind, by Franco Piavoli, a poetic and intimate film, looking at the small things in life, with very little dialogue. It was presented at Locarno two years ago and the film is produced by Zefiro Film, Metafilm and RAI Cinema, with contributions from the Cultural Ministry. At the time it didn’t have a distribution but now it is being released thanks to the Istituto Luce.

(Translated from Italian)