A Taviani Trio

ABOUT THE TAVIANI BROTHERS:

Italian filmmaker Vittorio Taviani and his younger brother Paolo might just as well be joined at the hip; it is all but impossible to write of one brother without mentioning the other. The son of an anti-fascist lawyer who suffered mightily during the Mussolini years, Vittorio attended the University of Pisa, studying law while brother Paolo majored in liberal arts. Once the Tavianis developed an interest in cinema (Vittorio was inspired by a screening of Rossellini's PAISA), they became professionally inseparable. In 1950, the brothers established a Pisa cinema society with their future collaborator Valentino Orsini. In concert with screenwriter Cesare Zavattini, Vittorio and Paolo directed the 1954 short subject SAN MINIATO, Iuglio 44 (1954), about Nazi atrocities in Italy. Together once more with Orsini, the brothers directed their first feature in 1962, A MAN FOR BURNING. The modus operandi of Vittorio and Paolo is to work on their screenplays together, then take turns directing individual scenes, never interfering with each other's creative choices. Recurring themes in their films include war, anti-fascism, traditionalism vs. modernism, marriage, divorce, and life among the working poor in the Southern Italian region of Tuscany. The Tavianis have won Cannes Film Festival awards for Padre Padrone (1977) and NIGHT OF THE SHOOTING STARS (1983); the latter film was also honored with a citation from the National Society of Film Critics. KAOS (1984) is an anthology film based on stories by Luigi Pirandello. In 1987, the brothers made their first American film, GOOD MORNING BABYLON (1987), a perceptive homage to Hollywood's salad days. Their film CAESAR MUST DIE (2012) won the Golden Bear at Berlin.

THE FILMS:

NIGHT OF THE SHOOTING STARS
Genre: Drama
Duration: 105 min
1982
Starring: Omero Antonutti, Margarita Lozano, Claudio Bigagli, Massimo Bonetti

Synopsis: The Night of San Lorenzo, the night of the shooting stars, is the night when dreams come true in Italian folklore. In 1944, a group of Italians flee their town after hearing rumors that the Nazis plan to blow it up and that the Americans are about to arrive to liberate them.
“One of the greatest films of the 1980’s”
- Film Threat
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"By the end of this MAJESTIC entertainment one feels like the children in it: that one has not been told this story but dreamed it"
- Time Magazine

"Revealing unanticipated beauties everywhere, even amid the horrors of war ... the Tavianis' masterpiece."
-The New York Times


Awards:
Winner Grand Jury Prize at Cannes 1982
Winner National Society of Film Critics Awards: Best Film, Best Director
Winner David di Donatello Awards: Best Film , Best Director

PADRE PADRONE
Genre: Drama/Biography
Duration: 114 min
1977Starring: Omero Antonutti, Saverio Marconi, Marcella Michelangeli

Synopsis: Drawn from the real experience of writer Gavino Ledda, the film finds impoverished Sardinian boy Gavino (Fabrizio Forte) forced to quit school by his overbearing and abusive father (Omero Antonutti). Committed to the traditions of his homeland, Gavino's father feels his son is of more use to the family as a shepherd than a student. As he matures, the adult Gavino (Saverio Marconi) finds his way in the world, first by discovering music and then by learning a trade while serving in the military.

"Padre Padrone" is stirringly affirmative... vivid and very moving”
-The New York Times

Awards:
Winner Best Director At Cannes 1977

KAOS
Genre: Dramatic Comedy, Romance Duration: 188 min
1984
Starring: Margarita Lozano, Orazio Torrisi, Carlo Cartier

Synopsis: With a free adaptation from Luigi Pirandello’s works, the Taviani brothers have constructed an ethereal odyssey into the Sicilian landscape—with four stories and an epilogue—it brings together all the main actors whom the Tavianis had previously collaborated with, in a voluptuous naturalistic trip.

“A film with a profound and stirring sense of natural order.”
– The New York Times