Saturday, March 7, 2020
CASTRO THEATRE, SAN FRANCISCO
Presented by Luce Cinecittà and The Italian Cultural Institute under the auspices of the Consul General of Italy in San Francisco.
Organized by Cinema Italia San Francisco.
About the Program
On the occasion of Federico Fellini’s 100th anniversary and in conjunction with Federico Fellini at 100, Luce Cinecittà has organized a series of international initiatives to present the complete retrospective of his films in several locations around the world, including, in North America: New York, Boston, Washington, Houston, Cleveland, Toronto, BAMPFA Berkeley, and Harvard University. San Francisco paid homage to the great Maestro with a selection of his works on March 7, 2020, at the Castro Theatre.
Presented by Istituto Luce Cinecittà and Istituto Italiano Cultura SF, director Annamaria Di Giorgio, under the auspices of Consul General of Italy Lorenzo Ortona and organized by Cinema Italia San Francisco as its 10th program. The one-day marathon with four films selected by program director Amelia Antonucci was part of the Federico Fellini 100 Tour, a series of centennial tributes to Federico Fellini (1920–1993), which travels to major museums and film institutions worldwide, coordinated by Paola Ruggiero and Camilla Cormanni of Luce Cinecittà.
All films (unless noted) were digitally restored by Luce Cinecittà, Cineteca di Bologna and Cineteca Nazionale.
March 7th Full Schedule:
12:30 p.m. – La strada (1954) 104 min. B/W, 35mm, courtesy of Janus Films.
3:00 p.m. – Giulietta degli spiriti (Juliet of the Spirits) (1965) 144 min. Color, DCP restored by Cinecittà-CSC.
6:00 p.m. – Amarcord (1973) 127 min. Color, DCP restored by Cineteca di Bologna.
10:00 pm – I Vitelloni (1953) 108 min. B/W, DCP restored by Cinecittà-CSC.
Click here for the complete series of films, lectures and more at BAMPFA Berkeley January 16 through May 17, 2020
About Federico Fellini
Federico Fellini, a poet of cinema, was born in Rimini, Italy, on January 20, 1920, and died in Rome on October 31, 1993. In a career of almost 50 years, he won the Cannes Palme d'Or for La Dolce Vita, was nominated for 12 Academy Awards® and won four times in the category of Best Foreign Language Film (now called Best International Film), the most for any director in the Academy’s history. At the 65th Academy Awards in 1992, he received the honorary award for Lifetime Achievement.
His cinematic worlds of good-natured fools, early neorealist screenplays, and carnivalesque studies of society and human nature, blend to form the universe in which his unique sensibilities abide.
In the first two films of our series, we pay tribute to his muse and spouse Giulietta Masina. The third and last films are his memories and his fantastic world.
Presenting Organizations
Istituto Luce Cinecittà
Established in May 2010, following the merger of Cinecittà Holding and Istituto Luce (founded in 1924), Istituto Luce Cinecittà is the public service branch of the Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities and Tourism with the aim of promoting classic and contemporary Italian cinema worldwide, through traveling programs in major international institutions. Such programs include film retrospectives of Italy’s most prominent directors and actors, art and photographic exhibitions, book presentations, support in the selection of Italian films at film festivals, and the participation of Italian talents attending international events. It is also home to Cinecittà Studios. www.cinecitta.com
The Italian Cultural Institute of San Francisco
The Italian Cultural Institute promotes Italian language, culture, and the best of Italy by offering information about Italy, scholarships, and cultural events, such as: art exhibits, film screenings, concerts, and lectures. The Institute’s goal is to foster mutual understanding and cultural cooperation between Italy and the United States. www.iicsanfrancisco.esteri.it
Cinema Italia San Francisco
Founded in 2013, Cinema Italia SF is an organization that operates in San Francisco bringing to major screens the best of Italian Cinema. This will be the 10th program organized by CISF in the Bay Area: Pasolini (2013), Bertolucci (2014), De Sica (2015), Magnani (2016), Dino Risi and Lina Wertmüller (2017), Michelangelo Antonioni (2018), Marcello Mastroianni (2018), Ugo Tognazzi (2019), and Federico Fellini #Fellini100 (2020). Cinema Italia San Francisco is a member of Intersection for the Arts, which provides fiscal sponsorship, incubation and consulting to artists. www.cinemitaliasf.com
Image: © RGR Collection / Alamy Stock Photo
Important Advisory Posted March 5, 2020:
All those who have traveled to Italy in the 14 days prior to the Fellini 100 Film Festival are asked to refrain from participating in the event, based on the latest indications from the US government of March 4, 2020: in particular, the Center for Infectious Disease Prevention (CDC) has specified that all those arriving from Italy will have to undergo a voluntary self-isolation period of 14 days and monitor their health to avoid possible infections from Coronavirus. We are certain you will understand the current circumstances, and we thank you for your collaboration.
Refund Policy
Refunds must be requested to cinemaitaliasf@gmail.com by the latest by Friday, March 6, 2020 at 11:59 PM. Any refund requests after this specific time will not be honored.
1954. Italy. Directed by Federico Fellini. Screenplay by Federico Fellini, Tullio Pinelli. Cinematography by Otello Martelli. With Giulietta Masina, Anthony Quinn, Richard Basehart, Aldo Silvestri. In Italian with English subtitles. B/W. 104 min.
Federico Fellini is known best for his mid-century phantasmagorical satires of the phony, self-obsessed counter-culture set, films such as the 1960’s La Dolce Vita and 1963’s 8 1/2. Earlier in his career, he made smaller, more delicate dramas, but one thing remained the constant: that life is essentially a circus, and death is the final curtain call.
1954’s La Strada stars the director’s diminutive wife and muse, Giulietta Masina, as a young woman who joins a strongman street entertainer on the road and soon discovers her calling as a clown. The film plays off Masina’s wide-eyed innocence with the strongman’s brutish strength and short temper, while the audience waits nervously in the aisles for tragedy to strike. La Strada won the 1957 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. At the 1954 Venice Film Festival, Fellini was honored with the Silver Lion.
“Unadorned, strikingly realistic and yet genuinely tender and compassionate.” – New York Times
35mm print, courtesy of Janus Films.
Image: Courtesy of Janus Films
1965. Italy, France. Directed by Federico Fellini. Screenplay by Federico Fellini, Tullio Pinelli, Ennio Flaiano, Brunello Rondi. Cinematography by Gianni Di Venanzo. With Giulietta Masina, Mario Pisu, Sandra Milo, Valentina Cortese. In Italian, French, Spanish and English with English subtitles. Color. 144 min.
This Italian-French fantasy comedy-drama is about the visions, memories, and mysticism of a middle-aged woman that help her to find the strength to leave her philandering husband. The film uses caricatural types and dream situations to represent a psychic landscape. It was Fellini's first feature-length color film but followed his use of color in “The Temptation of Doctor Antonio” episode of Boccaccio ’70 (1962). Juliet of the Spirits won the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1966. Giulietta Masina won Best Actress at the 1966 David di Donatello Awards.
DCP print from Luce Cinecittà-CSC. Courtesy of Janus Films.
Image: Courtesy of Janus Films
1973. Italy, France. Directed by Federico Fellini. Screenplay by Federico Fellini, Tonino Guerra. Cinematography by Giuseppe Rotunno. With Pupella Maggio, Magali Noël, Armando Brancia, Bruno Zonin. In Italian with English subtitles. Color. 127 min.
“Amarcord may possibly be Federico Fellini’s most marvelous film. It’s an extravagantly funny, sometimes dreamlike evocation of a year in the life of a small Italian coastal town in the nineteen-thirties, not as it literally was, perhaps, but as it is recalled by a director with a superstar’s access to the resources of the Italian film industry and a piper’s command over our imaginations.” – Vincent Canby, The New York Times
Fellini's ode to his youth and satirical depiction of small-town Italy during 1930s fascism is considered his most personal film. Co-written with poet and scribe Tonino Guerra, and shot at Rome's Cinecittà Studios, it is set to Nino Rota's nostalgic score. This carnivalesque portrait of provincial Italy during the fascist period, the most personal film from Federico Fellini, satirizes the director’s youth and turns daily life into a circus of social rituals, adolescent desires, male fantasies, and political subterfuge, all set to Nino Rota’s classic, nostalgia-tinged score. The Academy Award ®–winning Amarcord (1975 Best Foreign Language Film) remains one of cinema's enduring treasures.
The film is restored by Cinema Ritrovato-Cineteca di Bologna and premiered at the Venice International Film Festival in September 2019.
DCP restoration from Cineteca di Bologna. Courtesy of Janus Films.
Image: Courtesy of Janus Films
1953. Italy, France. Directed by Federico Fellini. Screenplay by Federico Fellini, Ennio Flaiano, Tullio Pinelli. Cinematography by Carlo Carlini, Otello Martelli, Luciano Trasatti. With Franco Interlenghi, Alberto Sordi, Franco Fabrizi, Leopoldo Trieste, Riccardo Fellini. In Italian with English subtitles. B/W. 108 min.
An international success and recipient of an Academy Award® nomination for Best Original Screenplay, I Vitelloni compassionately details a year in the life of a group of small-town layabouts struggling to find meaning in their lives.
Five young men dream of success as they drift lazily through life in a small Italian village. Fausto (Franco Fabrizi), the group's leader, is a womanizer; Riccardo (Riccardo Fellini, the director’s brother) craves fame; Alberto (Alberto Sordi) is a hopeless dreamer; Moraldo (Franco Interlenghi) fantasizes about life in the city, and Leopoldo (Leopoldo Trieste) is an aspiring playwright. As Fausto chases a string of women, to the horror of his pregnant wife, the other four blunder their way from one uneventful experience to the next.
DCP print from Luce Cinecittà-CSC. Courtesy of Janus Films.
Image: Courtesy of Janus Films