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ROMANCE AND CIGARETTES

12.07 - 17.00 Moscow Cinema, Red Hall
15.07 - 22.00 Nairi Cinema, Large Hall
2005, USA, 115 min.

Script/Dir.: John Turturro, Dir. of Phot.: Tom Stern, Prod. Design: Donna Zakowska, Sound: Tod A. Maitland, Edit.: Ray Hubley, Prod.: John Penotti, John Turturro.
Cast: James Gandolfini, Susan Sarandon, Kate Winslet, Steve Buscemi, Christopher Walken.

This is a down-and-dirty musical love story set in the world of the working class. Nick is an ironworker who builds and repairs bridges. He's married to Kitty, a dressmaker, a strong and gentle woman with whom he has three daughters. He is carrying on a torrid affair with a redheaded woman named Tula. Nick is basically a good, hardworking man driven forward by will and blinded by his urges. Like Oedipus at Colonus, he is sent into exile and searches to find his way back through the damage he has done. The film explores the cost and value of a relationship through life and death. When the characters can no longer express themselves with language, they break into song. It is their way to escape the harsh reality of their world - to dream and to connect to another human being.

John Turturro

Born 1957, Brooklyn, New York, USA:
One of the top character actors of his era, he is a fixture of the contemporary American independent filmmaking landscape. Studied at the Yale School of Drama. He made his film debut in Scorsese's 1980 masterpiece Raging Bull. That same year, he debuted on Broadway in Death of a Salesman. His breakthrough performance did not arrive until Spike Lee cast him as a bigoted pizzeria worker in 1989's Do the Right Thing. In 1991 the Coens cast him as the titular Barton Fink, a performance that garnered Best Actor honors at the Cannes IFF. Subsequent lead roles were infrequent, although he wrote, directed, and starred in Mac, a little-seen feature that won him a Golden Camera award for Best First Feature at the 1992 Cannes IFF. In 1998, the actor again collaborated with both Lee and the Coen brothers, working with the former on He Got Game and the latter on The Big Lebowski. Turturro wrote, directed, produced, and starred in Illuminata, a comedy set against the backdrop of a turn-of-the-century New York Theater Company. The following year, he again took on the New York theater, appearing in Tim Robbins' Cradle Will Rock, an exploration of the relationship between art and politics set in 1930s New York.

Filmography
Mac (1992), Illuminata (1998), Romance & Cigarettes (2005).

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Nearest Screening

FIST IN HIS POCKET

RETROSPECTIVES

Script/Dir.: Marco Bellocchio, Dir. of Phot.: Alberto Marrama, Compos.: Ennio Morricone, Prod. Design.: Gisella Longo, Edit.: Silvano Agosti, Prod.: Enzo Doria.
Cast:. Lou Castel, Paola Pitagora, Marino Masé, Liliana Gerace, Stefania Troglio, Jeannie McNeil.

On a rural estate live three brothers, a sister, and their blind, religious mother. Three of the siblings have epilepsy, the fourth and eldest, Augusto does not, and he's about to break away from the family: he's in love with Lucia and planning to move to the city. Augusto's sister Guilia tries to frustrate the lovers, while another brother, Alessandro, hatches a far-reaching plot to free himself of his mother's demands and other family responsibilities, to give Augusto the wherewithal to leave with Lucia, and, perhaps, to pursue incestuous impulses with his sister.

Awards
Silver Ribbon - Best Original Story, Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists, 1966; Silver Sail, Locarno IFF, 1965.

Nearest Screening

ARCANA

INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION
Documentary Films

Script/Dir./ Dir. of Phot./Prod.: Cristobal Vicente, Compos.: Carlos Canales, Toto Alvarez, Sound: Mario Diaz, Rafael Huerta, Cristobal Vicente. Edit.: Cristobal Vicente, Carlos Klein.

This film presnts a record of the last working year of the old prison of Valparaiso, which closed in 1999. It is a homage to the prison and to the values and customs of the men, who have secretly lived within it during its 150 year history.

PHOTOGALLERY