Within a complex evolution in the field of cinema, independent cinema is showing its vitality in Italy in the footsteps of creative documentary, and non-fiction feature film. There are many reasons and, among them, the use of digital techniques, making the production not only cheaper but also “lighter”, is no doubt a key driver of this new vitality, but not only this. New distribution channels, once unexpected, have appeared in Europe; co-productions and the Media program succeeded in giving new life to cinema, finding new authors, new documentarists and most of all new issues and new places that, even if recurring in the documentary field, are completely forgotten by fiction cinema and as a consequence by the large distribution channels. Until a few years ago, documentaries were confined mainly within the cage of institutional production, giving the product a rather didactic and paternalistic function. It’s not by chance if the highest expressions are free from those constraints and arising from a look on sub-subordinated or sub-cultural realities, as the works by De Seta and Silvano Agosti. Today, the digital technique results in a new perspective, representing an even greater revolution than for fiction: you can implement that more direct approach to the object that is the basis of the very idea of documentary cinema. For all these reasons we decided to dedicate an entire festival to the world of documentaries, a way to stop and have a look on what the young filmmakers from the Mediterranean basin wanted to focus, revealing once again their desire to show subcultures, distant cultures and examples of coexistence. It is not by chance we made this choice after Corso Salani’s death, last June, to remember this abnormal author, a director of reality rather than a classical documentarist. Following his path, even geographically, we have selected the movies of this first edition of Ulassai Film Festival. If the borders, and border crossings, are the
main themes of our documentaries, cultural hinges are leitmotifs as well as a wise and sometimes merciless look at the transformations of our sea. There is a talk on borders and boundaries in “Magna Istria”, in “This is my land... Hebron” and in “Il futuro del mondo passa qui”. They look at the future of our sea, meant as the main vehicle of communication between peoples in “Oil” and in “La baia dei lupi”. It’s again cultural hinges the main theme in “Almost married” and in “Heart quake”, but also in “La Repubblica delle trombe”, introducing us to another frequent theme in our selection of movies: music, the glue between different cultures and expression of a renewing tradition, as in “Il canto scaltro”. The authors communicate with each other as you can see, they share ideas and educational routes, and a festival like this must make them communicate with the public. The criterion in cinema is always the same in the end, since it was born: to be seen or not to be seen.
by Giuseppe Gori
- Dedicate to Corso Salani
