Director Duccio Chiarini’s 2014 film ‘Short Skin’ Opens This Weekend In New York At The CINEMA VILLAGE on 12TH Street. The DVD Will Be Available October 20.
19-year-old Matteo Creatini has had one amazing year.
At 18, he found himself, without much experience and without a single acting class starring in Italy’s definitive coming of age movie, Short Skin, a film about his penis. (Or, rather, his character, Edoardo’s.) Though the camera doesn’t capture it, practically everyone in the film gets a look at it, so I had to ask; was this a little embarrassing?
“No”, Matteo told me, “I have to say that I that I didn’t feel at all awkward on the set because Duccio and all his team proved to be very human and the script was delicately written. I understood right away that it wasn’t American Pie and so I could let myself go!
But of course this is a question an old lady like me would ask a young man; young people don’t get embarrassed so easily anymore and I’m probably a little out of touch with how they think and feel. So when the dialogue in Short Skin seemed very authentic to me, I asked Matteo if he agreed. Did Chiarini capture the way young people talk or did it just seem that way to me?
“The young people’s dialogue is, in my opinion, one of the movie’s strengths”, says Matteo. “Nicola (Nocchi, who plays Arturo) and I made friends quickly and being the same age we got along naturally on the set, we did some long but good work on the script along with Duccio, trying to make the lines real!”
“There are so many themes in Short Skin”, he says “It’s funny, I promise you, but it also makes you think about a lot of stereotypes that become intrenched in society, first of all about the “invincibility” of men and the impossibility of failing sexually and socially.”
Matteo, who is 19 now and a bright young guy with an equally bright future doesn’t have a girlfriend at the moment , but keeps himself busy with his band CreMa, a mix of rap and electronica that he does in a studio at the University of Bologna. And he has his dog, a sweet brown lab.
I’d like to urge Matteo to come to the USA (he can visit his sister, who lives in Iowa!); the girls will be all over him when they see his film.
If you are in New York City don’t miss Short Skin at the Cinema Village on E. 12th Street. And if you’re not, the DVD will be available on October 20. Stay tuned to I Love Italian Movies for details.
I Love Italian Everything 
