18/12/2023 - Actress Paola Cortellesi’s directorial debut - a black and white comedy about domestic abuse and women’s rights – is the country’s cinematographic success story of the year

Ticket sales in Italy of There Is Still Tomorrow [+see also:
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film profile], the country’s film event of the year, have even exceeded those achieved by cult film Barbie, totalling 4,395,868 admissions (worth 29,976,654 euros), according to figures released by Cinetel. Greta Gerwig’s movie, which has just received nine nominations at the Golden Globes, has so far recorded 4,389,568 admissions (for total earnings of 32,118,359 euros). Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer [+see also:
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film profile], meanwhile, lags significantly behind with only 3,746,365 cinema admissions (for a total of 27,978,795 euros).

Actress Paola Cortellesi’s directorial debut, There Is Still Tomorrow, which won three awards at Rome Film Fest 2023, has rocketed its way into the top ten highest grossing Italian films of all time (since rankings began in 1995, that is), as well as into Cinetel’s 25 highest grossing Italian and foreign films of all time, claiming 22nd place. It’s the 2009 movie Avatar which boasts pole position in this particular ranking (earning 65.6 million euros).

Cortellesi’s movie is now a case study. Shot in black and white – a clear homage to neorealist cinema – it tells the story of a housewife who suffers domestic abuse at the hands of her husband in postwar Rome, and tackles the themes of the patriarchy and female emancipation at a time when women were first winning the right to vote, on 2 June 1946. The feminist message is clear, simple and direct, and it has been especially well-received by female audiences who queued up to see the film. A Cinexpert Italy report reveals that 58% of audience members have been women and 42% men.

“I’ve asked myself why it is that this film resonates with people so much”, Paolo Cortellesi has mused in various interviews, a director who recently celebrated her 50th birthday. “It’s a story which concerns us all, revealing different sides of the patriarchy”. The film has hit cinemas at a time when femicide and women’s rights are dominating public debate, following the murder of young Giulia Cecchettin. Speaking to The New York Times, Cortellesi explained that she wanted to make “a modern film set in the past, because I think that, unfortunately, there’s a lot that hasn’t changed. There has been some progress - our rights have changed, the law has changed, but not entirely; mentalities haven’t changed". To date, the film has been sold in 18 countries.

(Translated from Italian)