Italian Film Festival
5 - 9 November 1998
Guiness Theatre, The Substation
45, Armenian Street, Singapore 179936.
Tel: 337-7535/ 337-7800; Fax: 337-2729
Presented by the Italian Cultural Institute and The Substation |
Film Schedule: Films/Times/Ratings
5 Nov Thursday 7.30 pm Acquero
6 Nov Friday 7.30 pm L'Isola Alla Deriva
6 Nov Friday 9.30 pm Roma, Citta Aperta
7 Nov Saturday 6.30 pm La Dolce Vita
7 Nov Saturday 9 pm L'Avventura
8 Nov Sunday 4 pm L'Avventura
8 Nov Sunday 6.30 pm L'Isola Alla Deriva
8 Nov Sunday 9 pm Good Morning Babylon
9 Nov Monday 7.30 pm La Dolce Vita
Tickets: $8 and $6 (students/NSF/senior citizens concession)
Tel: 337-7535/ 337-7800; Fax: 337-2729
Film Synopses (directly from Substation Press Release):
- La Dolce Vita (Fellini, 1960)
- The movie which immortalised the decadent Roman society of stars, aristocrats, and celebrities centred on the famous Via Veneto of the 1950s. The late great Marcello Mastroianni plays a tabloid reporter whose job is to gather juicy stories about these people. World-weary through a series of nightclub parties and encounters with women, he knows the emptiness of his society but is unable to change. The film contains juxtapositions of memorable images and outrageous events, though not as flamboyant or carnivalesque as Fellinišs later work. And of course, the film immortalised the title phrase, and gave us the word "paparazzi". Complex, rich and entertaining.
- L'Avventura (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1960)
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An intriguing film with its groundbreaking film narrative technique. A young woman disappears during a weekend yachting trip. Her best friend and her fiance lead the search for her . . . the film is not so much about whether the woman will be found, but an examination of human relationships and human alienation.
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Rome, Open City (Roberto Rossellini, 1945)
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A classic film set in Italy during the Second World War, made by Roberto Rossellini, a major figure in post-war Italian neo-realism. A portrait of the struggles of ordinary people under German occupation. Manfredi, a member of the Communist Resistance, is pursued by the Germans and finds refuge with Pina, who is engaged to Francesco, a partisan. Manfredi makes contact with Don Pietro, a priest who is helping a group of partisans. Later, Francesco, Manfredi and Don Pietro are captured by the Germans. Manfredi is tortured by the Gestapo and Don Pietro is later executed before his parishioners. Shot under difficult conditions only a few weeks after the Germans retreated from Rome, Rossellini had to use bits of left-over film and whatever equipment he could find, shooting on-location around war-torn Rome
- Good Morning Babylon (Paolo and Vittorio Taviani, 1987, 115 mins).
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Two Italian brothers from a family of stonemasons who have restored cathedrals for generations, go to America in 1915 to seek their fortunes after the family business goes bankrupt. They end up working in Hollywood with D.W. Griffith on his epic film Intolerance, and marry beautiful actresses. But with the advent of World War I, everything changes as the brothers find themselves fighting on opposite sides. By the Taviani brothers, award-winning filmmakers of The Night of San Lorenzo and Padre Padrone.
"A valentine to the early days of moviemaking, and a statement about the immortality of art, be it sculpture or film." - Leonard Maltin
- An Island Adrift (L'Isola Alla Deriva) Dir: Mottola. 1993.
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A 9-year-old boy, fed up with life, runs away and meets a mysterious woman "Mademoiselle" by chance. "Mademoiselle" has spent her life caring for a dying old man - there is nothing left of her dreams. It is the boyšs birthday, and the woman has a surprise for him - she will take him on a cruise, far away from life, to a charming world, an island . . .
- Acquero (1994)
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A pilgrimage to the Sanctuary of the Sacred Mountain of Varallo becomes the catalyst for change in the lives of Bruna, and her ex-lover Fabio. Among the group of pilgrims is a "mad" scientist, Acquero, who has a strange prediction about the culmination of the pilgrimage.
