10/06/2005

While in Rome the French and Italian professionals were trying to energise co-production relationships between the two countries and to improve the distribution of films made on both sides of the Alps, more modest local initiatives, such as the first edition of Italian Cinema Encounters gives an opportunity to French cinemagoers to discover the latest Italian films.

With only 14 features released in the French cinemas in 2004, the new generation of Italian filmmakers have to rely on numerous festivals, such as Annecy or Villerupt, to reach the French public. In fact, the distribution of Italian films in France is limited to only a few prints, reducing automatically their chances of success at the box-office, due to the bottle-neck of releases and the very fast rotation of new films. So Buongiorno Notte [+see also:
trailer
interview: Marco Bellocchio, director …
film profile] by Marco Bellocchio with 127 000 tickets last year in France was released with 41 prints, Gente di Roma [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (49 000 spectators) from 14 prints, The Keys House [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (28 000 tickets) from 18 prints, Caterina va en città (17 000 spectators in 2004) from 19 prints, Il Dono [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (11 000 tickets) from 10 prints, L'Isola (7000 spectators) from 10 prints and L’Etrange Monsieur Peppino (5000 tickets) from 6 prints.

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The festivals’ difficult task is to familiarise the French public with films that are often not distributed in France. That is why the Toulouse association Cinéma Paradiso, in collaboration with the cinema ABC, decided to create Italian Cinema Encounters which have proved to be very popular. The public prize was awarded to After Midnight [+see also:
film review
interview: Davide Ferrario
interview: Giorgio Pasotti
film profile] by Davide Ferrario which will be distributed in France on the 6th of July by Océan Films with a total of 15 prints. Among the 15 feature films in the programme were notably Fuori dal mondo by Giuseppe Piccioni, La spectatrice by Paolo Franchi, Miracolo à Palerme by Beppe Cino, Brucio nel vento [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Silvio Soldini, Mobbing [+see also:
film review
interview: Francesca Comencini
interview: Luca Bigazzi
interview: Pierre Todeschini
film profile] by Francesca Comencini, Il ritorno di Cagliostro by Daniele Cipri and Franco Maresco, Volevo solo dormire addosso by Eugenio Cappuccio, Il vestito da sposa by Fiorella Infascelli and also L’amore ritrovato de Carlo Mazzacurati.

(Translated from French)