“In 2019, The Traitor [+lire aussi :
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Q&A : Marco Bellocchio
fiche film], which was released straight after the Cannes Film Festival, made 5 million Euros at the box office. This year, Nostalgia [+lire aussi :
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interview : Mario Martone
interview : Pierfrancesco Favino
fiche film], also released in the wake of Cannes and starring the same protagonist, Pierfrancesco Favino, barely earned 1 million”. This is how Domenico Dinoia, Chair of FICE – the Italian Federation of Arthouse Film, illustrates the deep crisis miring down Italian cinemas in this post-pandemic period. He was speaking in Rome during the presentation of the nineth edition of “Arthouse Summer. Premieres in Cinemas”, an initiative promoting high-quality film in the summer period, which has turned into a cry for help voiced by cinema operators who are urging audiences not to abandon movie theatres.

(L'article continue plus bas - Inf. publicitaire)

“Cinemas are struggling to overcome the difficulties caused by two long years of the pandemic, with prolonged, strict measures of containment on the one hand and an explosion in domestic film consumption on the other”, Dinoia explains. “Yet policies aimed at ensuring visibility, promotion and vital spaces for the cinema market, especially for arthouse films, to help them contend with other, far more economically powerful works, are still thin on the ground”.

Regulation over exclusivity windows which singles out cinemas as a central element in the release chain, for foreign films too, and a rule stipulating percentages to be paid to cinemas for use of these works, are two of the options suggested by professionals in order to avoid numerous cinemas definitively closing their doors.

Meanwhile, arthouse cinema operators are battling on as best they can, reviving Italian and European arthouse film over the summer, “a period in which it makes more sense to work in the interests of a selective audience who want to be stimulated”, according to FICE Vice-President Giuliana Fantoni. This year’s edition of “Arthouse Summer. Premieres in Cinemas” foresees a programme of 12 fiction feature films and a selection of recent documentaries, for which the Federation will ensure widespread broadcasting and promotion in June, July and August, across the 400+ cinemas taking part in the scheme.

The selected films are (in order of their release):  Madeleine Collins [+lire aussi :
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interview : Antoine Barraud
fiche film] by Antoine Barraud, Lo chiamavano Trinità (restored edition) by E.B. Clucher, The Odd-Job Men [+lire aussi :
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interview : Neus Ballús
fiche film] by Neus Ballus, Where Life Begins [+lire aussi :
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fiche film] by Stéphane Freiss, Lovers [+lire aussi :
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interview : Nicole Garcia
fiche film] by Nicole Garcia, The Peacock’s Paradise [+lire aussi :
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interview : Laura Bispuri
fiche film] by Laura Bispuri, Elvis by Baz Luhrmann, Casablanca Beats [+lire aussi :
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fiche film] by Nabil Ayouch, The Young Lovers [+lire aussi :
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fiche film] by Carine Tardieu, Secret Love [+lire aussi :
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interview : Eva Husson
fiche film] by Eva Husson, Rimini [+lire aussi :
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interview : Ulrich Seidl
fiche film] by Ulrich Seidl and 200 Meters [+lire aussi :
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interview : Ameen Nayfeh
fiche film] by Ameen Nayfeh.

High-quality documentaries hitting cinemas in the summer months include Los Zuluagas [+lire aussi :
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fiche film] by Flavia Montini, Jane By Charlotte [+lire aussi :
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fiche film] by Charlotte Gainsbourg, The Princess [+lire aussi :
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fiche film] by Ed Perkins, Yoko [+lire aussi :
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fiche film] by Maria Iovine, Hong Kong’s Revolution of Our Time by Kiwi Chow, and the USA’s All the Streets Are Silent by Jeremy Elkin.

The full list of titles screening in this 2022 edition of “Arthouse Summer” can be found here.