Screening over 30 films from Italy’s most prominent filmmakers, the 19th Lavazza Italian Film Festival offers a jam-packed program. The festival plays at Palace Cinemas across the country and runs throughout September and October.
The opening night feature is Loro, the new film from Oscar-winning director Paolo Sorrentino. About the life and times of controversial and scandal-plagued Italin politician Silvio Berlusconi, the film aspires to ‘gradually unpeel the complex personality and motivations of the billionaire former Prime Minister.’
Other key titles include the crime thriller Dogman (about “a gentle dog lover driven to take a stand against a local bully”), the magic-realist fable Happy as Lazzaro (“a beguiling allegory of love, loss and compassion”) and the comedy My Big Gay Italian Wedding (“a merry comedy of matrimony”).
The festival also includes a small but impressive retrospective program. A newly restored version of the classic western A Fistful of Dollars is on the bill, as is a restored cut of Dario Argento’s 1977 horror-masterpiece Suspiria.
The Lavazza Italian Film Festival is coming to the following locations:
Sydney: 11 Sept – 7 Oct, Palace Norton Street, Palace Verona, Chauvel Cinemas, Palace Central
Canberra: 12 Sept – 7 Oct, Palace Electric Cinemas
Melbourne: 13 Sept – 7 Oct, Palace Cinema Como, Palace Westgarth, Palace Balwyn, Palace Brighton Bay, Kino
Cinemas, The Astor Theatre
Brisbane: 19 Sept – 14 Oct, Palace Barracks and Palace Centro
Adelaide: 19 Sept – 14 Oct, Palace Nova Eastend Cinemas and Palace Nova Prospect Cinemas
Perth: 27 Sept – 17 Oct, Cinema Paradiso, Luna on SX
Hobart: 18 Oct – 24 Oct, The State Cinema
Fore more information head to the official website.
