[Photo & video-gallery on https://www.facebook.com/charlie.curtis88/]
(I write with an unforgivable delay of over 24 hours, since we are talking now of 10.21, I can’t keep up even with myself anymore… )
After almost twenty thousand steps yesterday, today waking and getting up is as hard as it gets…
Today, as yesterday there’s nothing interesting for me at the Film Festival, but this time I already know where to go!
By the way, there was the meeting with Alfonso Cuarón actually, but given the vastness of the fucks given, I don’t even remember if it was yesterday or today.
Now, before being excomunicada, I have nothing against Cuarón, it simply does not represent for me what a Tarantino, a Burton or a Nolan can represent. I liked The Little Princess, the third Harry Potter and Gravity, while I’m a little annoyed for “Roma”, not only because it’s fucking heavy, but you could give it any title in the world, why Roma? It just feels almost completely unrelated… (yes I know it is the name of the barrio where it is set, but I still think is a bit of a smartass, ok?).
That said, I’m going to Cinecittà today!
To get to Cinecittà from where I am, it takes about 1h: I take the bus N° 2 to Piazzale Flaminio, quick croissant + Estathé (iced tea), and from there take Line A to the penultimate stop of the route.
I can feel that I’m not in Kansas anymore: around there’s almost nothing apart from the historic entrance of the largest studios in Europe that stands in front of me.
With 20 € I can get the guided tour “Cinecittà shows off” + the MIAC (Italian Audiovisual Museum), I accept the offer and go ahead. I’ve got about an hour before the tour starts, so I’m gonna grab a sandwich and start writing. Meanwhile I look around me: people at lunch, all coming from studies and offices, bureaucrats and set craftsmen, mixed with some sporadic tourist, what an unusual scenario!
Here comes Chiara, our guide, and we start the tour…
Inaugurated by Mussolini in 1936, Cinecittà is composed of 21 theatres, whose architectures still scream fascism even now. I must say that it is not a beautiful sight: all buildings are quite abandoned to themselves, a lot of cracks, spots of moisture and signs of near abandonment. The guide explains to me that it’s not that there is no money to fix them, it’s that it’s not that important. Even at first impression level, when international productions arrive, what is missing in the appearances is amply compensated with the availability of solutions and spaces. So they leave it like this… -_-
The first theatre we see is called “The Mass Gallery” because at the time it was used for the selection of extras. We speak of gargantuan productions such as Ben-Hur, shot in Cinecittà 2 (where there is now a shopping center) which counted about 10,000 extras. Now, it is used as a tailoring and warehouse/set design workshop. In fact, we see the costumes of Boris 4.
To the news that while we are there, they are shooting Boris 4 I start to feel restless: I would really like to see a set of a series that I like, especially when it’s a meta stuff like Boris! I promise to use my charisma later to infiltrate.
We move on to a large outdoor set, almost a village in size. The floor is concrete while the buildings are all fiberglass and recall Roman temples, villages like Pompeii and Herculaneum, there is Nazareth, Verona and even 1400 Florence. Here were filmed a lot of productions: The Young Messiah, Rome (HBO), Gangs of New York, Dr. Who (The Flames of Pompeii), The Borgias, etc…
It’s amazing how all the details are made real, you can also notice technical details such as the irregular tendency of vertical architectural lines, which widen to counter the effect of wide angles.
From the sets, we pass in the middle of the theaters, we see the immense Theatre 5 (only from the outside because occupied by the filming of Italians got talent), we pass in front of the 3 where the shooting of Boris are in progress, there is Corrado Guzzanti outside who smokes a cigarette and smiles at us, In the meantime”Arianna” makes a short peep too, god I love that series!
We end with Theater 1, which is huge but empty and so is a bit of a waste of time…
After the one-hour guided tour, and failing the charisma roll to sneak into the Boris set, I can wander around and see the other exhibitions. I begin with the MIAC, which path develops with 12 environments marked by thematic areas, each focused on a theme such as sound, photography, actors and the central corridor with a comic strip timeline of Italian cinema, all over the walls. I am alone in the building and I can enjoy it very well, all the rooms are masterpieces of lights game and design, that transport you on a wonderful and very interactive journey.
After this huge trip, I pass on to the Palazzina Presidenziale (Presidential Building), a set has been created to allow visitors to become immersed in the history of great movies and film genres, hear stories and discover fun facts through a selection of images, videos, interviews and original costumes worn by such movie stars as Liz Taylor, Alida Valli, Giulietta Masina, Nino Manfredi, Richard Burton and many others.
Remaining in the Palazzina, we move to the “Backstage” area: this is the second route, which offers a glimpse into the various cinema trades, with six rooms dedicated to film direction, screenwriting, sound editing, costumes and visual effects. In detail:
- The Director’s Room is recreated as an art-house studio where the public is inspired to discover the imaginative talent of six prominent directors, from Lina Wertmüller to Martin Scorsese, through their books, objects, photographs and personal items.
- The Script Room presents the process of transposing words into moving pictures, and displays excerpts of screenplays, storyboards and film sequences.
- The Sound Room unveils fun facts and anecdotes about the transition from silent films to sound films and lets visitors play with the dubbing process.
- The Costume Room allows its visitors to virtually construct a costume, matching garments, accessories and wigs based on well-known movies.
- The Fiction Room goes behind the scenes of cinematic fiction through words, images, videos, early special effects, set reconstructions at Cinecittà and the make-up effects that can completely transform the face of an actor.
- The Green Screen Room introduces one of the best-known effects of contemporary cinema: The Green Screen, the digital chroma key technology which sets people and objects against a virtual background.
As it was supposed to, I indulge myself into a little shopping at the gift shop. In my defense, I’m spending on the right stuff: three movie posters (Pulp Fiction, Forrest Gump and Edward Scissorhands that I’m going to try to get autographed by Tim Burton on Saturday), because on the spot I’ve decided that I’m going to hang them in the hallway back at home, and a USB stick in the shape of a clapperboard that I absolutely couldn’t leave there.
On the way back to the hotel, I stop for a snack of “supplì” and “pizza al taglio”, which I was forced to try… And now here I will be blaspheme but supplì are smaller versions of arancini (balls of rice, tomato and mozzarella, breaded and fried), and I’m sick of arancini, and the pizza slices it’s good, but it is pizza! If I was in Naples, where it’s born, but instead it is normal pizza selled in slices, so it’s the same in every other places I think… IDK, maybe I’m just ignoring some nuance…
I go back to the hotel and as usual I’m on the clock… Finally tonight I can make a glimmer of social life by catching two friends from here. Aperitif at “La Puncheria” (bar specialized in punch) and a quick bite at the Roma Beer Company again, all surrounded by Lazio supporters because there was the match and Ponte Milvio, where we are, is a stone’s throw from the Olympic Stadium. Btw talking to someone for more than 5 minutes after almost a week that I speak mostly alone is not bad at all!
This day is coming to an end too… For tomorrow I decided to take it easy, then from 4.30 pm I will be tapped into the Petrassi Hall of the Auditorium until about 11 pm, but finally I’ll see some movies!