Lucca Film Festival – From 21 to 29 September 2024

Guests Paul Schrader, Ethan Hawke, Matthew Modine, Pupi Avati, Ruben Östlund, Tonino De Bernardi, Massimo Gaudioso, Federico Cesari, Francesco Costabile, Francesco Di Leva, Francesco Gheghi and Carolina Crescentini

The twentieth edition of the Lucca Film Festival will be held from 21 to 29 September 2024, with the artistic direction of Nicola Borrelli. A rich program with numerous guests, from Chiara Mastroianni, godmother of the festival to Paul Schrader, Ethan Hawke, Matthew Modine, Pupi Avati, Ruben Östlund, Tonino De Bernardi, Massimo Gaudioso, Federico Cesari, Francesco Costabile, Francesco Di Leva, Francesco Gheghi, to Carolina Crescentini, who will preside over the jury of the LFF for Future competition.

Lucca Film Festival 2024 is rich and varied: the exhibition dedicated to Marcello Mastroianni and numerous screenings for a total of 50 works in Italian preview, coming from all over the world, including 12 feature films, 12 short films, 10 short films on environmental themes LFF For Future, 10 Italian debut works for Buona la prima!. For the international short and feature film competition, a popular jury is planned, the screenings of the competitions move to the Cinema Astra (feature films/short films/LFF For Future) and to the Auditorium Banca del Monte (Buona la prima!).

For the feature film competition, this edition marks the record of participation for the Lucca Film Festival 2024: in fact, there are over 230 works arriving from all over the world for the international competition, curated by Stefano Giorgi and Mattia Fiorino. 12 feature films in Italian preview to explore universally important themes and investigate cinematic cultures from all over the world. This year’s competition – the jury is composed of actress Lidia Vitale, director Valerio Mieli and screenwriter Guido Iuculano – is composed entirely of first works, mostly non-European: from the Saudi Norah, winner of the Jury Prize in the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes Film Festival, to the American African Giants, winner of the Best Screenplay Award at the Slamdance Film Festival. Also noteworthy is the presence of narratively impressive works such as the Japanese REI and the Iranian The Old Bachelor, winners of the two main awards at the Rotterdam Festival (Tiger Award and VPRO Big Screen Award), both lasting over 3 hours. The feature film competition aims to offer an overview of the most interesting works in world cinema, which is why the selection does not care about the provenance of the works but only their artistic quality: for the first year the festival will host a work from Saudi Arabia and a work from India (Swaha); after the success of the Russian After and the Chechen The Cage is looking for a bird in 2023, Liar, by Russian director Yulia Trofimova, is back in competition. Like every year, the prize for the winner will be 3 thousand euros.

Chiara Mastroianni will inaugurate the Lucca Film Festival with a tribute to her father Marcello, on the afternoon of September 21st at Palazzo Pfanner with the exhibition Marcello l’antidivo di successo, open to the public until October 27th. The exhibition is a tribute to Marcello Mastroianni, on the centenary of his birth and presents original posters, playbills, photo envelopes and sketches of the advertising material from the time when the films were released, all from the vast collection of Alessandro Orsucci. Film music is also central to this exhibition, with a unique display of original vinyl soundtracks, accompanied by original covers, often drawn, together with books and musical scores. “The exhibition – explains the curator Alessandro Orsucci – offers a survey of the actor’s films, genres, and extraordinary collaborations, based on research done on filmography, which allowed me to select the works precisely by taking into account the importance of the film and above all Marcello’s work with others”. The actor had, among other things, a special bond with Lucca: his beloved country house was in Pescaglia, on the Lucca hills, an eighteenth-century farmhouse where he spent much of his free time with his family and the biggest names in cinema who came to visit him. On the evening of the 21st, the official opening of the festival with Chiara Mastroianni and the remembrance of Marcello that continues with Flavio De Bernardinis and, to follow, the screening of Casanova 70, directed in 1965 by Mario Monicelli.

Actress Carolina Crescentini (Notte prima degli esami – Oggi, Parlami d’amore, I demoni di San Pietroburgo, Boris, I bastardi di Pizzofalcone) will preside over the jury of the second edition of LFF for Future, the competition curated by Leonardo Galeassi, born in 2023 in collaboration with the Sofidel Group, a leading company in the production of paper for hygienic and domestic use, known worldwide for the Regina brand. Crescentini, who recently finished filming the new Netflix series Mrs Playmen, directed by Riccardo Donna in the role of the protagonist, will be joined on the jury – to award the prize of 1,000 euros – by Luca Luisa of the historic cultural association La Cappella Underground and member of the Trieste Science+Fiction Festival, by the producer, director and filmmaker Andrea Morghen and by the director and teacher Giacomo Nencioni. Safeguarding the future from an environmental and social point of view is the key theme of this year’s edition which includes ten short films by young international directors and filmmakers. Ten shorts, of which 8 are Italian premieres and 1 (the Argentine Cuando Todo Arde) is a European premiere. From documentary to science fiction, passing through experimental narratives, the shorts in competition address the theme of sustainability in a rich and heterogeneous way. The jury of the competition will also be the protagonist, on Saturday 28 September, of a meeting with the public after the screening of the shorts at 5:30 pm.

The Lucca Film Festival, thanks to the support of SIAE, is announcing the first edition of the Buona la prima! competition, reserved for first works of Italian nationality in short film format, curated by the artistic director Cristina Puccinelli. The aim is to help emerging authors gain greater visibility. Out of ten selected films, three awards will be assigned by a jury of professionals in the sector: best first work, best screenplay and best soundtrack. This last recognition will be assigned in collaboration with the Luigi Boccherini Conservatory of Lucca and the Master M.A.I. (Musica Applicata all’Immagine). Also in collaboration with SIAE, the screenwriting course, “Scrivere Cinema”, created with the aim of helping young aspiring authors to refine the art of film writing. The course will be held by the screenwriter and director Cristina Puccinelli – of the artistic direction of the festival – and a lesson will be held by the screenwriter Massimo Gaudioso. At the end of the course, students will submit a short film subject and the best one will be awarded on September 29th with a prize of 1,000 euros to be used to develop the same work. A jury of experts – composed of Federico Micali, Lavinia Biagi and Cosimo Colamini – will decide the winner at their own, unquestionable discretion.

For the short film competition, curated by Laura Da Prato and Dario Ricci, in its tenth edition, over 500 works have arrived from all over the world: the 12 short films selected will be evaluated by a professional jury composed of the producer Simone Gandolfo, the director and author Rai Luca Rea and the Make up artist Dalia Colli and will be screened at the Cinema Astra on September 26th from 5:00 pm and on September 27th from 3:00 pm. 4 out of competition and 12 in competition, including 3 European premieres – The Bug, To Whip A Horse and Stereo-Vision and a world premiere, The most beautiful day in life, from China, will investigate family and sentimental relationships, presented from multiple points of view, sometimes new (such as Forever Yours, Binaud et Claude, Dissolution, Mum, Este no es Noruega), with a touch of irony and dark humor and sometimes bordering on horror cinema (Stereo Vision, Cults). Stories on the edge of unreality but deeply rooted in contemporary times such as the award-winning I am not a Robot (Winner of the Sitges fantasy festival and the Melies d’Argent), the Austrian Nightfaces and the Russian The bug, of Kafkaesque memory. Special event the short Good Boy, directed by Tom Stuart and starring Ben Whishaw, produced by the Italian Elettra Pizzi and selected for the short list of the 2024 Oscar Awards, will be screened at the Cinema Astra on Sunday 29 September at 8:30 pm and will see a special live link from London with its protagonists.

Lucca Effetto Cinema returns on Saturday 28 September 2024, the open-air event part of the Lucca Film Festival, with the artistic direction of Irene Passaglia, which will transform the historic center into an open-air stage. Organized with the Municipality of Lucca and the Chamber of Commerce of North-West Tuscany, it will see the participation of 40 public establishments and 20 theater and dance companies. The performances, inspired by famous films, will alternate in the thematic areas of the city. New this year is the Extemporaneous Painting “ENTER ON SCENE!”, where artists will interpret iconic scenes from the cinema. Prizes are planned for the best performances and scenography.

The lineup of guests for this edition is rich: the American director and screenwriter Paul Schrader, Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in 2022, protagonist, at the Cinema Astra, of a masterclass, on September 26 at 12:00, open to the public and of a retrospective of his films, who on September 27 will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award. Then the American actor, screenwriter, writer, director and producer Ethan Hawke, who on September 26 at 21:00 will present, in Italian preview, his latest film as director, Wildcat, and will receive the Golden Panther Award. On September 27, at 18:00, at the Church of S. Francesco, Hawke, will hold a masterclass open to the public, in collaboration with the IMT School, as part of BRIGHT-NIGHT 2024, European Research Night and will award the Lifetime Achievement Award to Paul Schrader, who directed him in First Reformed. Then the actor Matthew Modine, who will present on September 25 at 9:00 pm in a meeting moderated by Silvia Bizio the film The Martini Short, an existential comedy by Stephen Wallis that tells the story of a sick film director as he begins to shoot what he believes to be his last work. Another special guest, the Swedish director Ruben Östlund, twice Palme d’Or at Cannes, in 2017 and 2022, respectively for The Square and Triangle of Sadness, who will hold a masterclass on September 28, will receive the Golden Panther Award and will be honored with a retrospective of his films. The Lucca FF parterre will also be illuminated by director Pupi Avati, on Sunday 22 September at 9:00 pm and honored with the screening of his horror classic The House with Laughing Windows, director Tonino De Bernardi, who will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award on 24 September, director and screenwriter Massimo Gaudioso who will hold a masterclass on 22 September and actor Federico Cesari, who will receive the Nuovi Protagonisti Award and will hold a meeting with the public.

Another preview will close the festival, the screening of Familia, directed by Francesco Costabile recently presented at the Venice Film Festival, which will feature the director, actor Francesco Di Leva and young actor Francesco Gheghi, winner of the Orizzonti Award for best actor. The screening, in collaboration with Fice, marks the passing of the baton between two film events, the Lucca Film Festival and Le Giornate del cinema d’essai, a union between festival and industry. Also out of competition and in the section dedicated to young Tuscan directors, the screening, on September 23 at the Astra cinema at 9 pm, the homage to Mario Tobino with the documentary Mario Tobino per le Antiche Mura, a tribute to the great psychiatrist and writer born in Viareggio, which will be presented by the director Maria Erica Pacileo and the producer Fernando Maraghini. Also in the section dedicated to Tuscan authors, the screening of C’è un posto nel mondo by Francesco Falaschi, which will see the director and the actors Cristiana Dell’Anna, Daniele Parisi and Luigi Fedele as guests.

For the Focus section, among others, the screening of the film Roma blues by Gianluca Manzetti with Francesco Gheghi and Warpigs, directed by Giacomo Pellegrini, the story of two American soldiers during the Second World War. A new collaboration for the festival, with ACLI Lucca, for the film Recinti urbani, written and directed by Francesco Cerrone, which will be screened on Sunday September 29 at the Complesso San Micheletto. In collaboration with the 50&più association, on September 25th at 5:00 pm at the Complesso San Micheletto, presented by Flavio De Bernardis, the screening of Matrimonio all’italiana, by Vittorio De Sica, dated 1964, with Marcello Mastroianni. Friday, September 27th, at the Auditorium Banca del Monte at 5:00 pm, in collaboration with the 50&più association and in collaboration with the Giacomo Puccini Foundation, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the death of the composer born and lived in Lucca, the screening of Puccini by William Friedkin directed by Federico Salvetti in 2017. Friday, September 27th, at the Auditorium Banca del Monte at 6:00 pm, in collaboration with Lions Club Lucca Le Mura the screening of the film Lucca Effetto Cinema, directed in 2022 by Gino Bertini.

At the Lucca Film Festival, the IX edition of Over The Real, International Festival of Video and Multimedia Art, which presents the multimedia exhibition “Ipotesi di futuro”, curated by Veronica D’Auria, Lino Strangis and Maurizio Marco Tozzi, scheduled in the splendid rooms of Villa Bottini in Lucca from 21 to 29 September, with inauguration on Friday 20 September at 6 pm. The theme of the exhibition focuses on works that have attempted to deal with the concepts of metamorphosis, changes and mutations that are at the basis of the behavior of everything that exists in an atavistic sense but also a particular expression of an era like the current one, characterized by important historical variations. Among the participating artists Chiara Passa, Matteo Donà, Alberto Papotto, Simone Cavallo, Chiara Ciccarelli. Finally, an interactive connection will be available to the public with the Museo del Metaverso, a virtual museum created in 2007 in Second Life, by Rosanna Galvani, for the valorization of the artistic heritage created in that virtual world. The exhibition is made possible with the support of: Regione Toscana, GiovaniSì, Toscanaincontemporanea2024, Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Lucca, Fondazione Banca del Monte di Lucca, Dr. Emanuel Bertuccelli Private Banker Mediolanum Viareggio, the co-participation of The Lands of Puccini and the Chamber of Commerce of North-West Tuscany.

The Educational section of the Lucca Film Festival is enriched thanks to the contribution of the Ministry of Education and Merit, as part of the Cinema and Images for Schools program. Highlights include: Paul Schrader’s masterclass (September 26, 10:00 am, Cinema Astra after the screening of the film Mishima), the screening out of competition of the documentary Mario Tobino per le Antiche Mura with director Maria Erica Pacileo and producer Fernando Maraghini (September 24, 10:00 am, Cinema Astra), Banksy Unauthorized (September 25, 10:00 am, Auditorium San Micheletto) another interesting documentary presented by Prof. Alessandro Romanini and the presentation of Maria Montessori – La Nouvelle Femme (September 25, 10:00 am, Cinema Astra). These events offer students a unique opportunity to delve into the world of cinema and culture and the masterclasses can be followed live streaming on Zoom. In addition, LFF is launching an annual project dedicated to schools entitled “Rise! Storie in Movimento”, with the aim of building a digital narrative ecosystem. Then the event, curated by the journalist and critic Mario Serenellini, Tam Tam Truffaut: the beginnings, a tribute to the cinema of the Master of the Nouvelle Vague, with Il Cinema Che Migliora La Vita (The Cinema That Improves Life), (Radio-Canada, 1971) in the Italian edition curated by Mario Serenellini, in the original version with Italian subtitles and excerpts from the film The 400 Blows. In Montreal, in 1971, the filmmaker, at 39 years old, feels the need to talk not only about his films but also about himself. A lucid introspection, in the year in which his mother died and he emerges from depression after his relationship with Catherine Deneuve. Childhood and adolescence, existential and cinematographic apprenticeship, the great masters from Hitchcock to Welles, juvenile delinquency, military service. And, of course, women.