20 Aug DESERT SUITE by Fabrizio Ferraro
Venetian Nights 2024
DESERT SUITE
by Fabrizio FerraroItaly, 2024, 85′, colour, b/nScreenplay: Fabrizio Ferraro
03 September 13:15 – Sala Laguna V.O. sub EN Press, Industry 03 September 21:00 – Sala Laguna V.O. sub IT Followed by QA Reservation required on giornatedegliautori.com
A young man crosses Europe in search of a new Ithaca. Disillusioned with his own country, he moves from a meager grape harvest in arid Banyuls-sur-mer to Brussels and a seductive, if wistful, encounter with a young woman there. Lastly, he hides out in a soulless suite in a Rotterdam skyscraper, where, like an angel of death, he sets in motion a grisly game seasoned with drugs and a digital daze.
“Dear Fabrizio, I was amazed by your film. […] What fascinates me the most is its vertical structure, since, for the first time, the ‘bottom’ – the tectonic gods, the earth, the wine, and even the view from above of men toiling, hunched over, like animals – is the top, while the top level – the 30th floor in Rotterdam, with its stairways, the helicopters, and the delirious drug dream itself – is the real bottom. The film is bleak and bereft of any hope at all, since in this grand vertical Odyssey there is no homecoming; Ithaca, in the form of the vineyards of Banyuls, no longer exists, reduced to smoke and ash. I can’t stop seeing Homer all over this film. […] And that’s what the entire film comes down to: an initiation into the mystery of the visible, where appearances are always deceiving.” [from a letter by director Pablo Sigg] [da una lettere scritta dal regista Pablo Sigg]
Most of Fabrizio Ferraro’s films have been selected for European festivals such as the Berlinale, IFFR Rotterdam, Viennale, the Rome Film Fest, Torino Film Festival, FidMarseille, and Cinéma du Réel. His titles have also been screened at the leading film libraries (Lisbon, Barcelona and Lubiana, as well as ZKM, the Museo del Cinema in Turin and the Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Rome). From 2011 to 2022, he directed eight narrative features and four creative documentaries. In 2009, he received a special mention for Je suis Simone – La condition ouvrière l Torino Film Festival, while in October 2021, the Viennale arranged a retrospective of his films entitled Cinematography. Thoughts and imagination. In 2023, Ferraro won the Premio Speciale Gabbiano at the Bellaria Film Festival. Desert Suite develops a new series of films (which includes Wanted) that will be paired with the Indesiderati (Unwanted) series that is ongoing.