Paolo Sorrentino (La Grande Bellezza) and Paolo Virzì (Il Capitale Umano) are running the show right now, and they are doing a great job, but there are lots of others that are making groundbreaking new films in Italy right now. Here are ten directors that are changing the face of Italian cinema.
Daniele Luchetti
Daniele Luchetti – I spoke with Luchetti at New York City’s Open Roads: New Italian Cinema, and I told him that I saw him as a very modern Italian director who seems to want to break away from the old school directors. He said that beginning his career he had wanted to make classic films, but as he grew as a director his methods changed and he saw the importance of the director/actor relationship. He said that in the old days, Italian director had an almost antagonistic relationship with the stars, but that he was much more interested in the actor and what they embodied as human being.
For me, hearing this was one of those “ah-ha!” moments, because Luchetti is the king of finding an actor’s best self, and creates some of Italian cinema’s most emotional performances, like Elio Germano in La Nostra Vita Angela Finocchiara in Mio Fratello è Figlio Unico, and Micaela Ramozzatti in Anni Felici.
Alice Rohrwacher
Thirty-three year old Alice Rohrwacher started with a big splash with the beautiful little film Corpo Celeste and then caused a tidal wave with her more recent Le Mereviglie (the marvels), winning the Grand Prix at Cannes this past year.
Gennaro Nunziante
Gennaro Nunziante is the director who along side Checco Zalone made three hugely successful comedies breaking all kinds of box office records. His Sole a Catinelle is the top box office earner in Italian cinema history. Love him or hate him, he is definitely not old school, and this is not your mother’s style of comedy. With Checco, he is changing Italian comedy forever.
Antonio Piazza and Fabio Grassadonia
Antonio Piazza and Fabio Grassadonia serve to remind me that creative minds can pop up when you are least expecting it, and the best films are sometimes from the newest faces. The two young directors seemingly came out of nowhere to give us the haunting Salvo, about the hit man and the blind girl. Piazza has told me that they are currently writing the screenplay for a new movie, “a Sicilian ghost story”, and I can’t wait!
Francesco Munzi
Francesco Munzi’s story of an organized crime family in Calabria, Anime Nere (Black Souls) has been called “the new Gomorrah”, but in some ways I enjoyed it even more. The emotionally engaging story of brothers looking for different things from their legacy premiered at the Venice Film Festival and will do very well here in the US.
Luigi Lo Cascio
My favorite actor Luigi Lo Cascio proved himself an amazing director in his directorial debut, La Città Ideale (The ideal city), a film that’s a creative mix of thought-provoking, suspenseful, and even funny. Lo Cascio says he’ll direct again and I hope he keeps his word.
Valeria Golino
Valeria Golino’s a movie star that has made films in Italy and the US and has been a success at everything she’s done in her career; her first attempt at directing was no different. Miele (Honey) tells of a volunteer who assists suicides and the collateral effects of a life lived with that mission.
Ivano De Matteo
Actor/Director Ivano De Matteo’s by no means new in filmmaking but his is very innovative and his newest film, I Nostri Ragazzi, based on Herman Koch’s novel, The Dinner, is dark and thrilling, just like the book, in some ways even more so.
Asia Argento
Asia Argento, Dario’s daughter, is one of the more colorful names in Italian cinema, not afraid of the limelight as other Italian personalities and very outspoken. She directed Incompressa (Misunderstood) and after it premiered at Cannes she announced that she’d only be found from now on behind the camera. No doubt she’ll continue to shake things up, whatever she does.
I Love Italian Everything 