We are honoured to present Italian Film Festival Week initiated and supported by the Embassy of Republic of Italy in Latvia and organized by cultural agency “CREA Promotion”.
The film screenings will take place within 5 days in Riga in different cinema theatre from May 20th to May 25th. The main cinema venues would be the cinema theatre Kino Bize (Elizabetes str.37), KSuns (Elizabetes str. 83/85) and Latvian University (Visvalžu str. 4a). The general idea of the festival is to present and introduce Italian culture.
Italian Film Festival brings together a unique and diverse selection of contemporary Italian cinema, never screened before in Latvia, highlighting real and surreal stories from the stirringly diverse cinematic landscape of Italy. The first film of the program is “Zoran, My nephew the idiot” is four time winner of the 27th International Critic’s Week at the Venice Festival.
Film Screenings Program:
May 20th
KINO BIZE (Elizabtes str. 37)
4 pm starts
ZORAN, IL MIO NIPOTE SCEMO (ZORAN, MY NEPHEW THE IDIOT)
Director: Matteo Oleotto
Duration: 106 min.
Genre: Comedy
Release: 2018
Film language: Italian with English subtitles
The film narrates the story of Paolo, who passes his days dragging himself between drinking sessions in the local bar with his friends, an unsatisfying job and an unsuccessful dream of winning back his ex-wife. One day, he comes across his nephew Zoran, a curious boy of fifteen, born and raised in the mountains along with an aunt that Paolo did not know to have. After her death, Paolo is the only person who can take care of the boy. One day, he discovers that Zoran has a bizarre and unexpected gift: he is a real champion in playing darts. This is an opportunity for Paolo to take a revenge against the world. But things do not always develop as we would like them to.
May 21th
KINO BIZE (Elizabtes str. 37)
4 pm starts
LA FELICITÀ È UN SISTEMA COMPLESSO (THE COMPLEXITY OF HAPPINESS)
Director: Gianni Zanasi
Duration: 117 min.
Genre: Drama
Release: 2015
Film language: Italian with English subtitles
Enrico Giusti (Valerio Mastandrea) has a unique yet incredibly useful occupation and he’s brilliant at it. His job consists of approaching incompetent senior executives who are running their businesses to the ground, and, after he befriends them, he uses his influence to convince them to leave in order to appoint new CEOs that successfully turn the companies around, thereby avoiding bankruptcy and the loss of thousands of jobs.
But when a famous husband-and-wife entrepreneurial team die in a tragic car accident, everything changes. Enrico is suddenly charged with the task of preventing the two teenage heirs from taking the helm of an industrial group of national importance. It should be the easiest case, the culmination of his brilliant career, but things soon become difficult as the orphans make him question his choices. The unexpected arrival of his younger brother’s foreign girlfriend (Hadas Yaron) complicates things even further.
May 22nd
KINO BIZE (Elizabtes str. 37)
4 pm starts
THE STARTUP: ACCENDI IL TUO FUTURO (THE STARTUP)
Director: Alessandro D'Alatri
Duration: 97 min.
Genre: Drama
Release: 2017
Film language: Italian with English subtitles
A teenager, named Matteo, dreams of becoming a professional swimmer. When his coach prefers to him the son of the team's sponsors, Matteo takes revenge studying at the university Bocconi and inventing a social network.
May 22nd
Latvian University (Visvalžu str. 4a, 4th floor, 402. auditorium)
6pm
MIGNON È PARTITA MIGNON HAS COME TO STAY)
Director: Franceska Archibugi
Duration: 97 min.
Genre: Drama (film for teenagers)
Release: 1988
Film language: Italian with English subtitles
May 23d
KINO BIZE (Elizabtes str. 37)
4 pm starts
IL PADRE D’ITALIA (THERE IS A LIGHT)
Director: Fabio Mollo
Duration: 92 min.
Genre: Drama
Release: 2017
Film language: Italian with English subtitles
Fabio Mollo, who was nominated at the 2014 Raindance Film Festival for the Best Debut Feature award for Il Sud è Niente (South is Nothing), returns to the festival with his sophomore fiction feature, Il Padre d’Italia (There is a Light), a touching road movie about parenthood, responsibility and finding your limits. Mia, a pregnant, vagrant singer, meets Paolo, a sensible and heart-broken gay man, in a club and the pair hit it off immediately. Borrowing a company van, they embark on an epic road-trip from the north to the south of Italy. In truth, they’re both trying to run away from something in their lives that scares them; but for Mia, the ticking time bomb that is her baby can’t be diffused. Paolo has his own demons to contend with – can the pair find happiness on the run? As a deep and detailed character study of two unconventional, desperate people struggling to find something solid to hold on to, There is a Light leans heavily on its lead actors, Luca Marinelli and Isabella Ragonese.
May 24th
KSUNS (Elizabtes str. 83/85)
6pm starts
CI VUOLE UN FISICO (IN TOP FORM? NO THANK YOU! )
Director: Alessandro Tamburini
Duration: 80 min.
Genre: Romantic Comedy
Release: 2018
Film language: Italian with English subtitles
Alessandro has an appointment with Francesca, the girl of his dreams: a full nine, in the ungenerous ranking that places people on a scale of one to ten according to their physical appearance. Anna has an appointment with Pietro for whom she lost thirty pounds in three months, just trying to conform to that aesthetic canon that has little room for individual differences. The appointment of both is fixed in the same restaurant in Modena, but both will have to face a no show, the frequent fate of those who belong to the category “a bit ‘over the ugly” and much under the security of self, which both Alessandro and Anna belong to. In the beginning Alessandro cannot stand Francesca whom he considers ugly and pushy. But during a long night full of fights, wild dances, night-time baths and other adventures, he gets to know her better while he learns something about himself too. At dawn the two find themselves more mature, ready to deal with their past and, perhaps, in love. Just from their encounter can perhaps arise that awareness of self, that healthy attitude to not care for appearances that can opens the door to quality relationships?
For more information please visit Embassy’s homepage ambriga.esteri.it/ambasciata_riga/it/
***All screenings will be free of charge
