Focus on Great Britain Meetings, films, retrospectives, exhibitions and a red carpet specially created by the artist responsible for the décor of the Royal wedding between Prince William and Kate

Directors Terence Davies and David Hare, musician Michael Nyman and writer Hanif Kureishi will be headlining the Focus section which this year the International Rome Film Festival (27 October – 4 November 2011) has dedicated to Great Britain. The four artists will meet audiences in two meetings chaired by the English film critic Jonathan Romney. Together with Tilda Swinton they have also selected the twelve films to be shown in the retrospective entitled “Punks and Patriots”, produced in collaboration with the BFI London Film Festival. The selected films will shed light on the juxtaposition between the subversive youth culture of the Seventies and the British “mainstream” cultural production of the time. In addition to the films included in the retrospective and the meetings with the artists, the Focus program will host a showcase of 7 films, an exhibition and an artist’s installation on the red carpet. A unique touch to the red carpet for this sixth edition of the Festival will be provided by an installation prepared by artist Simon J. Lycett, who has collaborated for many years with the British Royal Family and was responsible for all the flower arrangements for the wedding of Prince William and Kate and for the flower displays in films such as Four weddings and a funeral. The auteur red carpet created in collaboration with London’s Chelsea Flower Show, will feature an abstract rendition of the Union Jack: three large panels entirely made out of metal, fruit and vegetable elements, will ideally combine urban Punk culture with traditional British wit. The Focus’ film showcase will feature seven films, including works by historical figures of the British film scene such as Page Eight by David Hare, which sees amongst its leading actors none other than Bill Nighy, known to world audiences thanks to his role as Rufus Scrimgeour in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and who will be attending the Festival in person; The Deep Blue Sea by Terence Davies; and Trishna by Michael Winterbottom, also to appear on this year’s red carpet. The showcase can also boast some of the best 2011 productions by up-and-coming directors such as Tyrannosaur by Paddy Considine and Wild Bill by Dexter Fletcher, British actors trying their hand for the first time behind the camera. The official exhibition of the sixth edition of the Festival will be “Raise the dead” by artist Douglas Gordon. It will feature a series of reworked photos of famous Italian actors and a video installation, “24 Hours Psycho Back and Forth and To and Fro”, dedicated to sequences of the film Psycho by Alfred Hitchcock.

The Festival will bestow the Marc’Aurelio Acting Award upon Richard Gere
It will be the restaured copy of Malicks’ film Days of Heaven (1978) to be screened before Richard Gere’s meeting with the public The sixth edition of the Festival will bestow the Marc’Aurelio Acting Award upon Richard Gere. The Hollywood star, in the front line of so many humanitarian battles, has played the lead in a great number of hit films such as American Gigolò, An Officer and a Gentleman, Pretty Woman as well as performing for great film directors including Robert Altman, Akira Kurosawa, Sydney Lumet, Francis Ford Coppola, Todd Haynes and Terrence Malick. It will be the restaured copy of Malicks’ film Days of Heaven (1978) to be screened before Richard Gere’s meeting with the public. The American actor will talk about his relationship with the director, retracing the early stages of his career.

The Adventures of Tintin: the Secret of the Unicorn will be seen at the next Festival The movie features Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson
The film The Adventures of Tintin: the Secret of the Unicorn (3D), which features Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson working side by side, as director and producer respectively, will be seen at the next International Rome Film Festival (27 October – 4 November, Auditorium Parco della Musica). The movie, which will be screened by both the Official Selection | Out of Competition, and the Alice sections, was shot entirely using the “motion capture” technique and was inspired by the world famous characters created by Hergé. The leading role is played by Jamie Bell, who will be walking down the red carpet at the Festival. “I discovered The Adventures of Tintin in 1981, after the presentation of the film The Raiders of the Lost Arc – Steven Spielberg told us – One of the reviews seemed to believe that my Indiana Jones character had been inspired by Hergé. When I later went out and bought the illustrator’s books and read them, I was completely taken by them and immediately thought Tintin’s adventures would make great films. With Jurassic Park – the director explained – I pushed the boundaries of digital animation techniques, but I’ve never directed an animated film. Working on The Adventures of Tintin I was aware that in order to do Hergé’s work justice I had to be as faithful as possible to his drawings and the chromatic palette that makes them so distinctive, so we had to use the ‘motion capture’ technique which can essentially “draw” the actor’s movements thus creating a mix between reality and cartoons”. “I’ve been a Tintin fan since the age of eight and I’ve been reading his adventures for a lifetime without ever getting bored, his stories always seem new to me – Peter Jackson told us – I knew that Steven [Spielberg] had bought the rights a while back and as a fan, not as a producer, I was constantly waiting for the film’s release and have been wondering for the last twenty years how it would be produced. When in the end Spielberg involved me in the project it was a great moment for me, I’d crowned my childhood dream”. The film The Adventures of Tintin: the Secret of the Unicorn (italian distribution Warner.Bros Pictures Italia) tells the story of the young and curious reporter Tintin (Jamie Bell) who finds himself in the clutches of the devilish Ivan Ivanovitch Sakharine (Daniel Craig), who is convinced he has stolen a treasure of untold value somehow linked to the nefarious pirate Red Rackham. But with the help of his dog Milou, the sharp-witted and hot-tempered Captain Haddock (Andy Serkis) and the bungling detectives Thompson & Thompson (Simon Pegg and Nick Frost), Tintin will find himself travelling the world searching for the Unicorn, a shipwrecked vessel that perhaps holds the key to a vast fortune and an ancient curse.

The great American director Michael Mann will hold a Lesson on Cinema
Sergio Rubini and Riccardo Scamarcio on the other hand will take the stage in the Duet formula Among the appointments included in Extra there will also be a chance to meet the great American director Michael Mann, author of films such as The Last of the Mohicans and Heat. Mann will actually hold a Lesson on Cinema, as many other celebrated directors and actors invited to Extra have done in the past (the Cohen Brothers, Malick, Coppola, Landis, Al Pacino and Meryl Streep). Sergio Rubini and Riccardo Scamarcio on the other hand will take the stage in the Duet formula, which in the past witnessed on stage conversations at the Auditorium between Bertolucci and Bellocchio, Servillo and Verdone, Muccino and Tornatore, Margherita Buy and Silvio Orlando. Among the films to be screened in this same section, out of competition, there’s the film by James Marsh Project Nim (distributed in Italy by Sacher and Feltrinelli). This time the British film-maker, whose Oscar® winning Man on Wire was featured in the Festival’s Extra section in 2008, tells the story of a chimpanzee adopted by a family of American scientists who ends up being used as a guinea pig for scientific experiments. The film, which caused quite a stir in the States, shows how even real events can be described with the same emotional involvement as a novel. Marsh, who many consider the most talented film and documentary maker of recent years, is also a juror of the Extra section which will award the Marc’Aurelio for best documentary.

A major event for the theatrical release of “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part I”
In the Alice nella città section there will also be a screening of “Little Glory”, Vincent Lanoo’s fourth feature film Just as in previous editions, “Twilight” fans will not be disappointed. The Alice nella città section of The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part I. The audience will get the chance to meet some of the film’s main actors – including two members of the Cullen family, the vampires Rosalie and Jasper Hale (played by Nikki Reid and Jackson Rathbone). Moreover they will see clips from the film, to be released on the 16th of November, and will have the opportunity to attend readings of excerpts from Stephanie Meyer’s book. Once more in the Alice nella città section there will also be a screening of Little Glory, Vincent Lanoo’s fourth feature film. The movie tells the story of the nineteen year old Shawn, played by Cameron Bright, the young Canadian actor who played a major role in the past in the Twilight saga.

by Ilaria Rebecchi