 NIGHT
OF THE SHOOTING STARS
ITALY 1981 DIRECTOR: PAOLO AND
VITTORIO TAVIANI
JULY 8 10 FRI 7:30 PM, SUN 4:45 PM
Guild Theatre
Winner of a Special Jury Prize at Cannes, the Tavianis’
immensely popular NIGHT OF THE SHOOTING STARS is a warm, fanciful
film inspired by the directors’ own experiences as children
during the war. Its pretext is storytelling itself: On a starry
night, a young mother lulls her infant child to sleep with
a bedtime story culled from memories of her own childhood.
In 1944, when she was six years old, the people of her Nazi-controlled
village had fled their homes and attempted to reach the advancing
Americans, rumored to be but a few miles away. The night was
August 10th, the Night of San Lorenzo (hence the original
Italian title)–a night, Tuscan folklore has it, when
every shooting star grants a wish. “[The] setting is
magical, like a Shakespearean forest, and the woman’s
account has the quality of folklore and legend, and even its
most tragic moments can be dizzyingly comic”—Pauline
Kael, THE NEW YORKER.
(105 mins.)
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FIORILE
ITALY/FRANCE/GERMANY 1993 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO
TAVIANI
JUL 9 10 SAT 7:30 PM, SUN 7 PM
Guild Theatre
“The Tavianis’ film recounts the changing fortunes
of a Tuscan family —the Benedetti (‘blessed’),
later known as the Maledetti (‘cursed’)—
from the time of the Napoleonic Wars, when a young girl’s
love for a French soldier is thwarted by her brother’s
theft of gold from the invading army’s coffers, to the
present day, when one of the girl’s descendants returns
from France with his children to introduce them to their disillusioned,
reclusive grandfather. In the intervening years, even when
the family was at its wealthiest at the start of the 20th
century, ambition, guilt, power and desire for vengeance dominated
the Benedettis’ lives—but what of the future?
Will the children at last be able to shake off the 200-year-old
‘curse’? A film of immense elegance, the Tuscan
landscape ravishingly photographed by Giuseppe Lanci, the
poignant emotions subtly underscored by Nicola Piovani’s
characteristically lovely music.”—TIME OUT. “In
the re-telling of a famous Tuscan legend . . . the Tavianis
have woven a fascinating historical tale of love and greed,
hope and terror. . . evocative, beautifully rendered, and
unusually compelling.”— Toronto Film Festival.
(118 mins.)
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 ELECTIVE
AFFINITIES
ITALY/FRANCE 1996 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO TAVIANI
JUL 15 17 FRI 7:30 PM, SUN 4:45 PM
Guild Theatre
The Taviani brother’s impressive adaptation of ELECTIVE
AFFINITIES transposes Goethe’s early 19th-century novel,
a highpoint of German romantic literature, to the Tavianis’
native Tuscany during the time of the Napoleonic Wars. The
work’s title is taken from a scientific treatise on
the “elective affinities” that draw particles
of matter together to form couples. The story centers on the
forces of attraction and repulsion acting on an apparently
happily married Baron (Jean-Hugues Anglade), his devoted wife
Charlotte (Isabelle Huppert), their attractive architect friend
Othon (Fabrizio Bentivoglio), and Charlotte’s convent-raised
goddaughter Ottilie (Marie Gillain). The handsome costume
drama plays out as a battle between scientific rationalism
and Enlightenment values, on the one hand, and the irrational
mysteries of destiny and the heart, on the other. “A
work of exquisite elegance and precision . . .absorbing viewing”—TIME
OUT. In French with English subtitles. (98 mins.)
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 A
MAN FOR BURNING
ITALY 1962 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO TAVIANI,
VALENTINO ORSINI
JUL 16 17 SAT 7:30 PM, SUN 7 PM
Guild Theatre
The Tavianis’ first feature audaciously mixes Italian
neorealism with the expressionistic, Brechtian theatricality
that would later come to characterize their work. Gian Maria
Volonté, in his first starring role, plays Salvatore,
a militant Sicilian trade union leader who urges the peasants
and workers of his homeland to confront the Mafia masters
who exploit them. Salvatore’s character is deeply flawed:
arrogant and egotistical to the point of megalomania, and
seemingly intent on martyrdom, his uncompromising radicalism
alienates him from those he seeks to liberate, and leads ultimately
to his demise. Vittorio Taviani has compared Salvatore to
Shakespeare’s ambiguous hero Coriolanus. “Their
first feature film immediately assured them a prominent place
in Italian cinema. A MAN FOR BURNING is a major production
not only because of its expressive force and its cultural
and political message, but also because it exhibits a very
personal and original approach to filmmaking.”—Bruno
Torri. (88 mins.)
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 ST.
MICHAEL HAD A ROOSTER
ITALY 1971 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTOIO TAVIANI
JUL 22 24 FRI 8 PM, SUN 5 PM
Whitsell Auditorium
Named “best Italian film of the past ten years”
by the Venice Film Festival in 1973, Vittorio Tavaini has
cited ST. MICHAEL, Vittorio as “perhaps our best film.”
Loosely based on Tolstoy’s story “The Divine and
the Human,” ST. MICHAEL presents three episodes in the
life of Giulio Manieri, a 19th-century Italian anarchist who
attempts to foment revolution in the Umbrian countryside.
His over-earnest zeal is met with fear and indifference from
the peasants and the authorities imprison him. During 10 years
in solitary confinement he develops a florid inner life, projecting
fantasies, memories and premonitions of his own death onto
the walls of his cell. Later, while being transferred to another
prison, he meets a group of younger revolutionaries and discovers
that he is now a political anachronism: his 19th-century libertarian
anarchism has been eclipsed by modern scientific socialism.
“Scalding . . . a bitter, Tolstoy-derived farce. . .
Giulio Brogi [gives] an uproarious performance.”—VILLAGE
VOICE. (90 mins.)
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 KAOS
ITALY 1984 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO TAVIANI
JUL 23 24 SAT 8 PM, SUN 7 PM
Whitsell Auditorium
KAOS is an adaptation of four tales by Pirandello, set in
the famed author’s native Sicily. Running the gamut
from tragedy to comedy, in typical Taviani fashion the stories
presents an everyday world infused with magic and mysticism.
In “The Other Son,” a mother rejects the love
of a son who too closely resembles the rapist who fathered
him. In “Moon Sickness,” an unfaithful young bride
discovers that her husband is a werewolf. “The Jar”
features the popular Sicilian comedy team of Franco Franchi
and Ciccio Ingrassia in a satire about the greed of a wealthy
landowner. In “Requiem,” a community of impoverished
shepherds connives to establish their own cemetery. In the
film’s wonderfully lyrical epilogue, “Conversations
with Mother,” Pirandello himself returns to his native
land to communicate with the ghost of his dead mother. “The
Tavianis’ most convincing achievement since such early,
radical and lean films as THE SUBVERSIVES and UNDER THE SIGN
OF SCORPIO.”—SIGHT AND SOUND. (188 mins.)
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 NIGHT
SUN
ITALY/FRANCE/GERMANY 1990 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO
TAVIANI
JUL 29 31 FRI 7:30 PM, SUN 4:30 PM
Guild Theatre
A haunting spiritual drama based on Tolstoy’s story
“Father Sergius,” NIGHT SUN is set in southern
Italy in the 18th century. Sergio (112 mins.)
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 PADRE
PADRONE
ITALY 1977 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO TAVIANI
JUL 30 31 SAT 7:30 PM, SUN 7 PM
Guild Theatre
The first film ever to win both the Palme d’Or and the
International Critics Prize at Cannes, PADRE PADRONE is freely
based on the autobiography of Gavino Ledda, an illiterate
Sardinian peasant boy who grew up to become a professor of
linguistics. At the centre of the film is the protagonist’s
struggle to break free from the cultural and emotional isolation
imposed on him by harsh economic conditions and a despotic
father. The film’s depiction of social conditions in
Southern Italy touched raw political nerves; in its linking
of authoritarianism to the father-son relationship, it explored
a theme common to many political films of the period. Ledda
himself appears at the beginning and end of the film, allowing
the brothers Taviani their characteristic interplay between
the conventions of various genres. “The Tavianis’
technique is deliberately barbaric; their vision is on the
nightmare side of primitivism . . . [An] extraordinary work–pungent
and carnal, and in faintly psychedelic Romanesque color.”—Pauline
Kael, THE NEW YORKER. (113 mins.)
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 THE
MEADOW
ITALY 1979 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO TAVIANI
AUG 5 FRI 7:30 PM Guild Theatre
One of the rare Taviani films set entirely in the present,
THE MEADOW features Isabella Rossellini (in her first starring
role) as the center of a love triangle. A young but disillusioned
lawyer returns from Milan to his Tuscan hometown of San Gimignano
on family business. There he falls in love with the beautiful
and idealistic Eugenia and, to make matters worse, befriends
her boyfriend Enzo, a committed radical. The protagonists,
caught between love and hate, optimism and despair, incarnate
the malaise generated at the end of the 1970s, as the more
idealistic hopes of the previous decade faded. Exquisitely
photographed by Franco Di Giacomo, and set to a lyrical score
by Ennio Morricone, the film explores a major Taviani theme:
the psychological and political relationship between people
and the land they inhabit. (120 mins.)
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 UNDER
THE SIGN OF SCORPIO
ITALY 1969 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO TAVIANI
AUG 6 SAT 7:30 PM Guild Theatre
A product of the political uprisings that roiled Europe in
1968, this film marked the Tavianis’ definitive break
with neorealist orthodoxy. Described as a work of “utopian
realism,” and offering an unsettling take on revolution,
power and violence, the film is a mythological allegory set
in an indeterminate time. The Scorpionids, a group of young
revolutionaries, are forced to evacuate the volcanic island
they inhabit. Arriving on another island, they encounter a
peaceful community of farmers living under the rule of Renno,
a former revolutionary and now a self-styled king. This island
too is volcanic, and the Scorpionids try to persuade its residents
to depart with them for the mainland. Characteristic of the
Tavianis’ burgeoning style, the Scorpionids’ utopian
dreams are given an overtly theatrical form: to put across
their vision to the farmers, they stage an exaggerated spectacle,
mixing melodrama, mime, and choral effects. Renno’s
subjects, however, do not share their dreams, leading inexorably
to the film’s shattering conclusion. (100 mins.)
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THE
SUBVERSIVES
ITALY 1967 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO TAVIANI
AUG 7 SUN 7 PM Guild Theatre
A key film of the socially committed Italian cinema of the
1960s, the THE SUBVERSIVES is a searching work set against
a real-life event: the 1964 death and funeral of Palmiro Togliatti,
longtime (and much beloved) leader of the Italian Communist
party. Togliatti’s funeral procession was attended by
millions; intercut with actual footage of the event, the film
explores the impact of his death on the personal lives and
political consciences of four conflicted characters: a young
photographer struggling with his privileged class origins;
a Communist Party official’s wife coming to terms with
her lesbianism; a dying filmmaker trying to complete a movie
about Leonardo da Vinci; and a Venezuelan revolutionary exiled
in Italy. Togliatti’s death, the Tavianis have said,
was “the end of a historical moment, of a political
line, of neorealism.” Reflecting a radical era’s
disenchantment with Communist orthodoxy yet desire for revolutionary
change, the story reveals the Tavianis’ sympathetic
yet always critical and questioning fascination for leftist
dreamers —anarchists, utopians, subversives—searching
for a new way. (110 mins.)
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 YOU’RE
LAUGHING
ITALY 1998 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO TAVIANI
AUG 12 14 FRI 7:30 PM, SUN 4:45 PM
Guild Theatre
A poignant and poetic adaptation of tales by Pirandello, YOU’RE
LAUGHING veers from absurdist humor to dreamy fantasy to troubling
tragedy while displays the brother’s characteristic
warmth and humanity and feel for landscape. “Felice,”
the film’s first segment, is a playful fable set in
Fascist Italy. The title character is a former opera baritone
frustrated in his job and unhappy in his marriage. While asleep,
however, he can’t stop laughing. Poor Felice can never
remember his happy dreams, but his angry wife is convinced
they’re about sex and other misconduct. “Two Kidnappings,”
parallels the Mafia kidnapping of a young boy in contemporary
Sicily with a similar crime in the same locale one hundred
years before. “Tragically beautiful. . . Once again,
the Tavianis seduce us.”—New York Film Festival.
“Mysterious . . . both moving and unnerving in its final
effect,”— Toronto Film Festival. (104 mins.)
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 GOOD
MORNING, BABYLON
ITALY/FRANCE/US 1987
DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO
TAVIANI
AUG 13 SAT 8 PM Guild Theatre
Their first English-language film is both a whimsical semi-autobiographical
work and a loving homage to the silent-era cinema of American
master D.W. Griffith. Brothers Nicola (Vincent Spano) and
Andrea (Joaquim De Almeida) are Tuscan artisans who make a
living restoring old cathedrals. When their business fails,
they immigrate to America, where they eventually find work
constructing sets for the Babylonian sequences of the 1916
Griffith epic INTOLERANCE. Meeting up with two beautiful movie
extras (Greta Scacchi and Désirée Becker), they
also find romance. Babylon’s broad performances and
exaggerated melodramatic style are clearly meant to evoke
silent cinema—and to forge a link between the traditional
artisan crafts of their rural Tuscan roots and the quintessentially
modern art form that became their vocation. “As in their
previous films, the Tavianis take an oblique and deeply personal
look at history to create a fable of enormous resonance .
. . The performances throughout are splendid, the symbolism
never intrusive, the entire achievement witty and elegant.”—TIME
OUT. (115 mins.)
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 ALLONSANFAN
ITALY 1974 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO TAVIANI
AUG 19 21 FRI 8 PM, SUN 4:30 PM
Guild Theatre
“The Tavianis break all the clichés and conventions
of historical drama and leftist cinema in this tragicomic
epic about the failure of revolutionary commitment. The setting
is Italy in 1816, and the chain of events set in motion by
the French Revolution serves as a backdrop: Napoleon’s
empire has fallen, the Restoration is under way. ALLONSANFAN—the
title is an Italian mispronunciation of “Allons enfants,”
the first words of “The Marseillaise”—stars
Marcello Mastroianni as Fulvio, an aristocrat-turned-revolutionary
whose utopian fervor has diminished during a period of incarceration.
Released from prison after refusing to betray his comrades
in the secret Sublime Brotherhood, he is immediately accused
by those same comrades of treachery. He attempts to resume
a normal life with his family, but is drawn against his will
to rejoin the cause—and to betray both it and himself.
The film is half-operatic, half-Brechtian in its stylizations,
with its glossy melodramatic theatricality constantly undercut
by an absurdist irony.”—Pacific Cinematheque.
“Aesthetically thrilling. . . A paean to cinema as a
revolutionary medium.”—MONTHLY FILM BULLETIN.
(111 mins.)
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 RESURRECTION
ITALY/FRANCE/GERMANY 2001 DIRECTORS: PAOLO AND VITTORIO
TAVIANI
AUG 20 21 SAT 8 PM, SUN 7 PM
Guild Theatre
Worldly Russian prince Dmitri Nekhludov reluctantly answers
a summons for jury duty in the case of a prostitute accused
of murder. His boredom turns to dismay when he recognizes
the accused as Katusha, a peasant girl he had seduced and
then forgotten years before. The shock of this realization
sets in motion a string of events that will radically transform
both Dmitri and Katusha. While their previous adaptations
of Tolstoy novels (ST. MICHAEL and NIGHT SUN) were chamber
tales of redemption, the Tavianis here utilize sumptuous period
decor to place their protagonist at the heart of a society
that both promises and undermines change. “Cinematographer
Franco Di Giacomo shows wide range, running from monochrome
Siberian woods and prisons to sumptuous Russians streets and
glamorous high society painted with Proustian conviction.
. . Stealing the show is Stefania Rocca’s vibrant, emotionally
expressive Katusha. . . a powerful heroine to the end.”—VARIETY.
(184 mins.)
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