THE FEMALE LENS .............. 12

ELISA AMORUSO

Named by Variety as one of “Italy’s Women Filmmakers Set to Make Waves”, Roman director Elisa Amoruso is a graduate of literature, performing arts and screenwriting. She has written several acclaimed short films including David of Donatello Award winner Breathe (2005). After her recent documentaries the much-talked-about Chiara Ferragni: Unposted (2019) and Bellissime (2019), Amoruso makes her fiction feature debut with the personal coming-of-age tale Sirley, based upon the writer-director's teenage years.

LAURA MUSCARDIN

With a background spanning cinema, TV and advertising, Laura Muscardin has directed and produced award-winning documentaries, short films and videos in Italy and abroad. Her latest film Cam's War, awarded at the Giffoni Festival, tackles the struggle between good and evil and is set in an apocalyptic world where the protagonist Cam is catapulted from childhood to adulthood in a violent and sudden way. Said Muscardin “Taking responsibility for acting against negative forces is the central theme of this story, an intimate and rooted theme in every human being that takes on greater dramatic weight when set in a world where society as we know it today appears lost.”

ROBERTO ROSSELLINI (1906 - 1977)

Born in Rome on May 8, 1906, Roberto Rossellini was destined for the world of film, as his father, construction firm owner Angiolo Giuseppe Rossellini, built the first cinema in Rome, the ‘Barberini’. In the early 1930s, Rossellini worked in various jobs and undertook his apprenticeship as an assistant to Italian filmmakers. An early documentary preceded his first feature film, The White Ship (1941). Shortly after the liberation of Rome in 1944, Rossellini started to film the anti-fascist Rome, Open City (1945) with Federico Fellini and Aldo Fabrizi, which won the Grand Prize at Cannes Film Festival. Two more neo-realist classics soon followed, Paisan (1946), for which he was nominated for a screen-writing Oscar in 1950, and Germany Year Zero (1948). After his Neorealist Trilogy, Rossellini produced two 'transitional films': Amore (1948) and La macchina ammazzacattivi (1952).

Famous collaborators Rossellini and Ingrid Bergman’s first work together was Stromboli (1950) where they became lovers, causing an international scandal as they were both already married. Together, they had three children and worked on films including Europa '51 (1952), Siamo Donne (1953) and Journey to Italy (1954). During the 1950s and ’60s Rossellini directed a number of works for the stage and directed his first film for television in 1956.

Standing as one of the greatest directors in Italian film history, and pivotal in the postwar rebirth of Italian cinema, Rossellini’s realistic style strongly influenced the development of important talents, including Federico Fellini and Martin Scorsese.

AMORE

L’AMORE

DRAMA | ITALY | 1948 | 69 MIN | 18+

Italian with English subtitles

CAST

Anna Magnani, Federico Fellini

An anthology film centered on two separate women both played by Anna Magnani, L’Amore tells the story of love and loneliness through two short films, “The Human Voice”, based on a play by Jean Cocteau and “The Miracle”, based on a story by Federico Fellini.

WINNER Nastro d’Argento 1949, Best Actress WINNER New York Film Critics Circle Awards 1950, Best Foreign Language Film