Stories from Sicily

Libere

Documentary detailing the successful Operation Mincemeat in 1943, which led to the Allies successfully invading Sicily and the war turning in their favour.

Quando i tedeschi non sapevano nuotare

William Friedkin attends an exorcism with Father Gabriele Amorth, as he treats an Italian woman named Cristina for the ninth time. Prior to filming, Cristina had purportedly been experiencing behavioural changes and “fits” that could not be explained by psychiatry, and which became worse during Christian holidays.

The boundless joy and unabashed passion of master gelato-maker Sergio Dondoli take center stage in this exuberant tribute to the delights of food, creativity, and a life well-lived. 'Sergio Dondoli's Happy Life' chronicles the rise of Dondoli and his world-famed Tuscan gelateria. What emerges is a portrait of a man who started from the humblest beginnings yet found a way to cultivate sweetness in all its forms through his life's work.

It's a condition known as "hypertrichosis" or "Ambras Syndrome," but in the 1500s it would transform one man into a national sensation and iconic fairy-tale character. His name: Petrus Gonsalvus, more commonly known today as the hairy hero of Beauty and the Beast.

After the World War I, Mussolini's perspective on life is severely altered; once a willful socialist reformer, now obsessed with the idea of power, he founds the National Fascist Party in 1921 and assumes political power in 1922, becoming the Duce, dictator of Italy. His success encourages Hitler to take power in Germany in 1933, opening the dark road to World War II. (Originally released as a two-part miniseries. Includes colorized archival footage.)

From Belgium, Jialai Wang maintains contact via smartphone and camera with her mother and grandmother in China. When her grandmother’s health deteriorates, Jialai returns to Shanghai, but when she arrives, her grandmother has already died, and she is left alone with her mother. A devout Buddhist, her mother seems to pay more attention to her daily prayers, Maoist past and dog Dongdong than she does to her daughter. She herself had been abandoned as a child by her own mother, when she divorced Jialai’s grandfather and moved to the city.

In the small mountain town of Barga, Italy, a group of four filmmakers speak with local cat lovers and immerse themselves in the unique world of street-trotting felines and Gattaras.

The first of a documentary serie about rural France.

Lo spazio che vive I 75 anni del CEIS di Rimini

Tour de Pise, l'inébranlable édifice

The intimate and passionate portrait of the late Max Croci in a documentary that recalls the human and cultural depth with the testimonies of friends and colleagues.

The italian writer Gianni Celati travels through the Po delta, the same landscapes of his collection of stories "Verso la foce", on a blue bus, accompanied by friends and relatives. His friend, renowned photographer Luigi Ghirri, follows the group by car.

An enormous shroud of white cement covers a hillside in the remote of western Sicily. It is both land art and a memorial to the town of Gibellina that was devastated by an earthquake in January 1968. It’s a work by the Italian artist Alberto Burri. He covered the ruins of the town with white cement and fissures function as pathways that wind through an area of roughly 20 acres. Petra Noordkamp captures Il Grande Cretto di Gibellina by Alberto Burri as an experentiental work of art filled with a sense of place and history.

The countryside around the Po delta is dotted with abandoned houses and farmhouses. The landscape appears desertic, almost humanless. Some people shares stories about their bond with the land while the italian writer Gianni Celati documents the tragedy and the loss of values in this new landscape of desolation, with a superb narrative style.

Luca lives for pizza. In an attempt to create a documentary about the cultural exchange between Neapolitan and Windsor pizza, the Covid-19 pandemic diminishes any hopes of flying to Italy and exploring his cultural background. With an infinite amount of free time, (and a hunger for pizza), Luca and his twin sister, Gemma, aim to save the documentary.

Il mio nome è Battaglia

Rummaging for Pasts is an experimental juxtaposition of two cinematic documents: the video diary of an international archaeological excavation and a collection of assorted eight millimeter found footage of Indian weddings.

The capture of Naples, the first great European city to be liberated, revealed the magnitude of the tasks involved in re-creating the means of livelihood and the machinery of government in a devastated, starving and disease-ridden city.