On March 23rd, at the Adriano Cinema in Rome, the screening of “The Invisible Red Thread”, Alessandro Bencivenga’s new film, was organized. The event gathered numerous industry professionals,celebrities of Italian theater, cinema, and television. Among the guests there was a well-known Italian actor and director Pino Quartullo.
The event started with a photo call in the cinema hall, in front of the movie poster. Then the guests moved into the screening room.
The preview began right away, without any introductory speech: a wise choice if the event organizers wanted to capture genuine audience reactions. The entire cast and crew, though, engaged in a long and fruitful dialogue with the audience immediately after the screening, creating a moment of genuine exchange of ideas and perspectives.
“The Invisible Red Thread” opens with events from Italy’s history in 1909 in Trentino region, intersecting with the main narrative set first in Ischia and later in Valsugana in 1953.
The viewer will discover what connects these two storylines and constitutes the invisible red thread that, once the events unfold, becomes clear, clarifying the authors’ intentions. We’ll just mention the themes the intricate plot is based on. They’re the ideals of social justice alive in some characters’ minds and hearts. The ideals of freedom guaranteed by the Constitution residing in every single person since birth. Much is reflected on the concept of an individual’s mental health, very relevant today in the world.
Produced by Silvestro Marino (Sly Production, Caserta) co-produced with Elio Voltolini (Screen Studio, Trento) – both enthusiastic about cinema as multifaceted artists – “The Invisible Red Thread” turns out to be a high-quality product having a stellar cast.
Massimo Bonetti, famous worldwide for being one of the actors in the very first “Piovra” /”Octopus” directed by Damiano Damiani, consolidates his success working in cinema and TV with directors like Paolo and Vittorio Taviani, Massimo Troisi, Pupi Avati, Luigi Perelli, Giuseppe Ferrara, Claudio Fragasso, heads the cast also thanks to his striking resemblance to Giovanni Giulio Anesini, the main character of the narrated events, who really existed, fighting for his ideals, between 1884 and 1953.
Ornella Muti, the undisputed star of international cinema – from her debut with Damiani in “La moglie più bella”/ The Most Beautiful Wife” to today. Ornella, in this film, proves to be a true Actress and goes far beyond her countless admirers’ expectations interpreting Ida Dalser, an independent, rebellious woman desiring freedom and equality between sexes – unheard of for her time (and maybe, with very few exceptions, even for ours).
Tommaso Bianco, a Neapolitan actor who debuted in cinema alongside Sophia Loren in 1971 in a Monicelli’s film and has since worked with the best Italian directors like Nanni Loy, Pasquale Squitieri, Lina Wertmuller, Ettore Scola, Roberto Benigni, and Mario Martone. As an actor, he’s also a cornerstone of Italian theater having shared the stage with Eduardo De Filippo and having acted for Dario Fo, Roberto De Simone, Franco Zeffirelli, Maurizio Scaparro, Giancarlo Sepe, Nino Taranto.
Every actor in this film is a chapter of Italian theater and cinema. Lello Arena, Antonio Catania, Gino Rivieccio, Rosario Terranova, Carlo Di Maio, Roberto Fazioli, Luisa Mariani, Vincenzo Leto, Alfredo Cozzolino, Antonio Riscetti, Francesco Villa of Duo Ale e Franz. The narrative voice of Luca Ward is also present in the work.
Paco De Rosa plays a nurse who breaks rigid hospital rules risking his job and freedom to give freedom back to a patient he takes care of. This part of the plot immediately brings to mind “Rental Family” by Hikari set in Tokyo and inscribes the work in the global panorama of films reflecting on freedom and on mental capacity thus connecting it to great cinema classics like “Someone Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” by Milos Forman.
Yet, the story is Italian. It tells the struggles for Trentino’s and South Tyrol’s independence before the Treaty of Saint Germain, dwells on the anticlerical campaign of Italian socialists culminating much later in the Lateran Pacts and on the emigration from South to North, the unquenchable strength of ideals and humanity persisting despite efforts to suppress and annihilate it in people’s hearts.
“The Invisible Red Thread” is an audiovisual product made without public funds. Thus, it is an independent Italian movie made with commitment and sacrifice. Now it is running for festivals like the one based in Turin (headed by Giulio Base) and other renowned international festivals.
For Silvestro Marino, one of “The Invisible Red Thread”‘s producers, this film is necessary not just as an art piece but also as an act of civil responsibility. Because behind it there is over a year of research emerging in every scene. Silvestro, as a producer, influences every stage of the film. In his view, the hardest phase was the beginning: finding resources and convincing partners and distributors the story deserved interest. Later phases were more gratifying: when the film came to life (first day on set), breathed (editing), met its the audience (the very first screening and every other screening that followed).
Marino is one of those producers choosing projects not just for economic sustainability but also for their cultural value and civil impact. Now that “The Invisible Red Thread” is in theaters, Silvestro accompanies it through festivals, schools, and associations. Because a work like this must make people think and discuss. The producer believes his task is building bridges between memory and contemporaneity, between art and conscience.
We wish this movie critical and audience success and, above all – a commercial success, meaning box office results rewarding the cast and crew’s work and creating conditions for new worthy films to be produced and distributed in Italy and beyond its borders.
Olga Matsyna
