06/10/2003

There was victory for the director Michelangelo Frammartino and his film Il Dono [+see also:
trailer
film profile] in the competitive section of the 21st Annecy Festival of Italian Cinema. The event started on September 30 and goes on until October 7. The president of the jury is Mimmo Calopresti and the other members include Vittorio Giacci, the director of the new university of cinema and TV at the Roman studios of Cinecitta, and they had the task of choosing the most original feature length film. The film Il Dono tell the story of the depopulation of a village in Calabria, Caulonia, without using any specific script or text. The population of the village dropped from around 15,000 inhabitants in 1950 to just a few hundred people today. It is produced by Santamira Produzioni, and the film was already written and edited by the director, Michelangelo Frammartino.

The jury also awarded a special prize to Piero Sanna for La destinazione, the story of a young man who joins the police at 18 years old and his confrontation with a miscarriage of justice. The film is produced by Ipotesi Cinema Sire and RAI Cinema. Finally, the CICAE Prize (the International Confederation of art and arthouse cinemas) went to Gianluca Maria Tavarelli for Break Free, the film about the hopes and dreams during a turbulent time of life, set by the sea in Abruzzo. The film was produced by Fandango.

(Translated from French)