Utente:Fiammy20/Sandbox

Lucca Film Festival retrospectives

The detailed history of the Lucca Film Festival

2005 Edition

The first edition of the Lucca Film Festival took place in the areas of the Cinema Centrale and the Teatro San Girolamo from 14^th to 17^th September 2005. This edition paid homage to Marco Melani, a deeply admired figure by the Festival’s organisers also thanks to a long research made on the artist. The research was aimed at revealing the unpublished aspects linked to his character through a series of interviews with his closest friends. One of the many milestones, on a journey that took place throughout the whole of Italy, was an interview with Tonino De Bernardi, an experimental underground film director from Turin and a close friend of Melani's. Enrico Ghezzi, film critic, essayist, television author, and a friend of Melani's, was the first to be interviewed and to introduce the first screening of 'L'uscita dalle officine Lumière' by the Lumière brothers. The second film to open the event was ‘Roma ore 11’ directed by Giuseppe De Santis, specially chosen as the favourite film of the late Marco Melani. The first edition of the Festival was characterised by 25 screenings, debates, and conferences, also giving space to works by emerging directors (Hernan Belon, Corinna Schnitt, Corneliu Porumboiu, Jeffrey St. Jules, Lorenzo Recio, Holger Ernst, Pablo Benedetti, and Massimo Coglitore). The first edition also laid the foundations for the Festival's programming: the presence of great guests such as Spanish director Adolfo Arrieta, a focus on debate and research, the desire to promote and investigate contemporary film productions, and, finally, retrospectives focusing on a particular theme or genre, or a director or actor.

Retrospectives and tributes to the main figures of cinema scene

• Marco Melani

2006 Edition

Through screenings, exhibitions, conferences, ranging from mainstream to experimental cinema in the second edition held in September 2006, the Festival managed to stand out among the many through its bold programming from the very beginning. The duration of the programme was changed from four days to seven, doubling the number of screenings and meetings. The event took place from 24^th to 30^th September and saw the participation of illustrious guests such as the American avant-garde director Kenneth Anger, Stephen Dwoskin (who created the official poster for the event and was the central character of a meeting with the public moderated by Julien Schmid) and Adolfo Arrieta, to whom a retrospective was dedicated, Michail Kobakhidze, Tonino De Bernardi and Paolo Benvenuti. Keja Ho Kramer, Anthea Kennedy, Ian Wiblin, Serge Bozon, Julien Schmid, Antonie Barraud and Louis Nero were also guests of this edition. There was a special tribute to British filmmaker Alan Clarke and a thematic retrospective dedicated to the road movie genre. During the second edition, the film ‘Permanent Vacation’ by Adolfo Arrieta, shot in Lucca during the 2005 Lucca Film Festival, was also premiered. The cinema lessons dedicated to thematic in-depth analysis and held before some of the screenings were held by Paolo Benvenuti and Professor Merlino, while Julien Schmid (who presented Stephen Dwoskin), Cristina Piccino (who presented Tonino De Bernardi) and Dominique Noquez (who presented Adolfo Arrieta) took care of the meetings with the guest directors of this edition. In this year the International Short Film Competition, which still exists today, was created.

Retrospectives and tributes to the main figures of the experimental and avant-garde cinema scene

• Kenneth Anger
• Stephen Dwoskin
• Adolfo Arrieta
• Tonino de Bernardi
• Mikheil Kobakhidze

Tributes to big-shot directors in the international cinema scene

• Alan Clarke

Retrospectives about a particular subject, nation or genre

• Road movie

Premieres

• Mondial premiere of Permanent Vacation, direcred by Adolfo Arrieta and shot in Lucca during Lucca Film Festival  in 2005