08/10/2008

October 10 will see the Italian release (on 70 prints, by Mikado) of the Palme d’Or winner of this year’s Cannes Film Festival and French submission for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar nomination. In France, The Class [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Carole Scotta
interview: Laurent Cantet
film profile] sold 500,000 admissions in its first week of release, drawing in even adolescents used only to blockbusters.

A wide-reaching phenomenon, Laurent Cantet’s film is comparable to Italian title Gomorrah [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Domenico Procacci
interview: Jean Labadie
interview: Matteo Garrone
film profile], which at Cannes just brushed the Palme, to “settle” for the Jury Grand Prize.

"We don’t except the same enormous success in Italy that the film had at home,” Mikado CEO Alessandro Usai told Cineuropa, "but besides more sophisticated audiences, who appreciate quality cinema, we’re also counting on schools, students and teachers. And perhaps with word-of-mouth a broad audience will be able to discover an exceptional film that deals with a reality very similar to Italy’s".

Set in a school in Paris’ 20th arrondissement, The Class sparked much debate at home, already begun with the publication of the novel by middle school teacher and journalist Francois Bègaudeau, upon which the film is based.

"However, [the film] was not meant to be ‘exemplary’ of the situation of French schools,” Cantet told the Italian press at the French embassy yesterday. "We only wanted to present these specific 20 kids that you see onscreen, in their individuality. We didn’t even seek out the ethnic melting pot – for me, the characters are not stereotypes. And in France, the debate on schools has always existed". As in all of Europe.

(Translated from Italian)