When renowned Italian auteur Marco Bellocchio called up his friend, fellow Italian auteur Marco Tullio Giordana (“Best of Youth”), about a project years in the making, the director promptly jumped on board. The resulting film is “The Life Apart,” premiering out of competition at this year’s Locarno Film Festival, where Giordana will also receive a Lifetime Achievement Pardo.
Adapted from Mariapia Veladiano’s acclaimed eponymous novel, “The Life Apart” is set in the Italian city of Vicenza between the 1980s and 2000s, where a young girl is shunned by her mother due to a large facial birthmark. Rebecca, played by Sara Ciocca as a child and Beatrice Barison as a young woman, finds solace in the piano, a talent she discovers with the help of her aunt and patron Erminia (Sonia Bergamasco).
“[Bellocchio] asked me to read the screenplay and I just loved it. Then I read the novel and fell in love with it too, so I rewrote the script so I could wear it like a lifejacket and feel comfortable in it,” Giordana tells Variety of first being approached with the project. Bellocchio not only signs the screenplay but is also the film’s producer alongside producing partner Simone Gattoni via Kavac Film in association with Rai Cinema and the Veneto Film Commission.
“When I dreamed of becoming a filmmaker, I had two idols: Marco Bellocchio and Bernardo Bertolucci,” Giordana added. “The admiration I had for Marco back then is the same today, even more so. As a producer, he has this incredible ability to organize the production of not only his films but also those of his peers and colleagues. He is also extremely respectful of your work whilst in the capacity of a producer. We had a wonderful relationship, but I must admit I always have good relationships with producers because I tend to stick to the budget.”
Staying faithful to the budget didn’t keep Giordana from making “The Life Apart” exactly as he envisioned it, from shooting in the beautiful city of Vicenza in the north of Italy to casting trained pianists for the two main roles. “I don’t like when there is a film about a musician and the camera cuts from their faces to their hands. I feel teased by the filmmaker,” he emphasised.
“[Casting] was even more important here since the two protagonists are musicians. We needed to have real professional piano players. Sonia, beyond being a great actress, is a trained concert artist, and Beatrice, also a fully trained pianist, had never acted before and now has a bright future in it.”
In the opening sequences of “The Life Apart,” the Italian director dedicates the film to late Belgian director Chantal Akerman. When asked about it, Giordana said he considers Akerman to be “one of the greatest filmmakers of the 20th century.”
“She would be my age if she was still alive today. She had her feature debut in 1975, soon before mine, and I immediately admired her a great deal. I had the opportunity to briefly meet her, she had seen my first film and talked to me with a lot of respect. [Akerman] took her life soon after her mother’s death and, somehow, when I thought to dedicate this film to someone, I immediately thought about her because I wish she could see the film and I wish she was still alive.”
Not only is the film’s dedicatory an emotional affair but being back in Locarno is also an emotionally-charged moment for Giordana, who won the festival’s Golden Leopard with his feature debut “To Love the Damned” in 1980. “Winning the Golden Leopard was a very important christening to my career. Going back fills me with tenderness, thinking about that year specifically. It’s an extraordinary festival with an extraordinary audience. The evening screenings in the Piazza Grande, with that massive screen and 7,000 watching your film… It’s like nowhere else in the world. You have such a close connection with the audience.”
As to what inspires the director to continue to make films almost five decades after that first Locarno visit, Giordana says: “I just look around. I listen to people talking, I read newspapers, magazines, and books. I watch other people’s films and, when something strikes me, I feel the wish to give it shape in the form of a film.”
