15/09/2005

Once the Mostra is over, shooting starts again in Venice. Indeed, many productions come to the lagoon (which attracts an average of a hundred productions a year, films, TV fictions, and commercials). After The Merchant of Venice (shooting from January to March 2004 on the Grand Canal and in the Palazzo Ducale), Walt Disney's new big production, Casanova (Summer-Autumn 2004, ten thousand walk-on parts), has raised a few eyebrows about how little profit it generated for the local economy.
For the new French thriller (Quelques jours en septembre, (a Mars Films production with Gémini and the Portuguese producer Madragoa), the scriptwriter Santiago Amigorena chose, for his directorial debut, to film Juliette Binoche and John Turturro in very special places, although they are not the most crowded in Venice: the Zitelle Church, the top of the campanile San Francesco della Vigna, the Erbaria of the Rialto, and the Piazza San Marco —where the team will shoot for an entire night.

A smooth intellectual atmosphere will be needed for the French TV fiction Sartre. L'âge des passions (produced by Jacques Kirsner for France 2, Tsr, and Rai) which Claude Goretta is currently directing on the lagoon (12-15 September). The Venice-scenes of this biographical film on the great Parisian philosopher also owemuch to the collaboration of Rosanna Roditi's company, Crg International. The locations chosen are all fascinating places: the campo Angelo Raffaele in Dorsoduro, the Hotel Mabapa on the Lido, the San Niccolò beach and the Academy of Fine Arts.

Last but not least, an Indian production is about to be the first to settle in Venice. The Fakir, by Anand Surapur, will stay for 4 weeks and require many walk-on parts. The action itself will take place in an art gallery built for the occasion within the premises of the Arsenal.

'We really shouldn't renounce our privileged relationships with the majors,' explains Guido Cerasuolo, co-producer of Casanova. 'Venice is one of the rare cities, in Italy and in the world, which guarantees to all productions they will find all they need here. In Italy, there are not enough incentives for foreign investors to come, and yet, here in Venice, the Disney film gave work to over a thousand locals and brought 40 million euros to our economy.'

(Translated from Italian)