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FESTIVALS France

Villerupt goes for Billo, Along the Ridge and Kreutzer

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The 29th edition of the Villerupt Italian Film Festival in the North of France concluded this weekend, with the vote of the main jury going to Billo, il grande Dakhaar by Laura Muscardin, while the press jury opted for Kim Rossi Stuart's directorial debut Along the Ridge [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Kim Rossi Stuart
film profile
]
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Billo, il grande Dakhaar is a comedy about a Senegalese immigrant in Italy and features music from Senegalese singer Youssou N'Dour. It is the second film about African immigrants in Italy to take Villerupt's top prize, after last year's Under the Black Sun by Enrico Verra.

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The favourite of the press jury, Along the Ridge, which also stars Rossi Stuart, was released in France last Thursday under the title Libero. The somewhat awkwardly paced if impressive drama focuses on a young boy (played with astonishing intensity by Alessandro Morace, who was a guest at Villerupt) who tries to cope with his demanding father (Rossi Stuart) and the sudden return of his mother (Slovakian-born actress Barbora Bobulova).

The true revelation of the festival was its closing film, Maurizio Sciarra’s adaptation of a Tolstoy novella, The Kreutzer Sonata – What is Love? (Quale Amore), which was honoured with the Amilcar du festival (Special Festival Prize). Kreutzer transposes Tolstoy's story of uxoricide to Lugano, Switzerland, where a young broker (Giorgio Pasotti) falls in love with a breathtakingly beautiful concert pianist (Vanessa Incontrada), who will give up her career in order to marry him and raise their children. But her passion for music remains undiminished, and her musical evenings, which are frequented by mostly male artists, drive her husband mad with jealousy.

Sciarra, who also co-wrote the fairly faithful adaptation with Claudio Piersanti, finds the perfect rhythm for his tightly narrated story, which is told explicitly from Pasotti's character's point of view. The young actor's performance is equally tightly controlled and, like the film, has been stripped to its essence without losing any of its ambiguity or deeper meanings.

Further awards included the Audience Prize for Fausto Brizzi's brilliant box office hit Night Before Finals, while the youth jury demonstrated maturity with their choice, Gianluca Maria Tavarelli's look at love for the over-40 crowd entitled Don't Make Any Plans For Tonight.

Over 40,000 visitors and over 300 screenings this year confirmed Villerupt's status as one of the most important showcases of Italian cinema outside of the country itself.

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