00:14Welcome back to the 45th edition of Le Giornate del Cinema Muto, the Pordenone Silent Film Festival.
00:20I'm standing in front of the Chiesa del Cristo, a church that was begun more or less around 1309,
00:26which is an appropriate place for me to be, given that I'm going to be talking about a film set
00:30in the medieval period.
00:32This is indeed one of the earliest churches that's still standing here in Pordenone.
00:36And the film that we're seeing today is a super production from 1924 called L'Arzigogolo.
00:42It's a word that really doesn't have a proper translation in English,
00:46and the one that's occasionally used, the whim, doesn't quite give the flavor of the word in Italian.
00:52This is a film that was Italia Almirante Mancini's last movie.
00:57So last year we began a series focusing on this superb actress who's more or less been forgotten
01:04in the history of silent cinema and cinema in general,
01:08when people talk about Francesca Bertini, Pina Menichelli, Lido Barelli.
01:12But Italia Almirante Mancini tends to be sort of pushed aside a bit.
01:16She, however, was somebody who was able to incarnate both the diva, the Italian diva from this period,
01:24but also was a terrific theater actress.
01:27And you really see her versatility in so many of the films that we've been able to screen.
01:32It's been a true rediscovery last year and this year.
01:35L'Arzigogolo is the sort of, I don't know quite how to put it, is the culmination of all of
01:41this.
01:42It's a film that many people have been wanting to see for ages.
01:44The only known print for a very long time was in Brazil.
01:48And then by complete chance, a tinted version, not quite complete,
01:52was found in the Cinetechia da Friuli, right here in Friuli.
01:55And thanks to a wonderful collaboration between the archive in Sao Paulo,
01:59the one in Germona, and also the Museo del Cinema in Torino, in Turin, here in Italy,
02:04we're able to finally present what is a super production.
02:07It's based on a play by Sam Benelli, a writer who was extraordinarily popular at the time.
02:14Think more or less in the kind of Gabriele D'Annunzio line.
02:17Now he's been largely forgotten outside of Italy.
02:20He's still well known for La Cena della Beffe,
02:23which was a play that also appeared, performed, was performed on Broadway as The Jest,
02:29starring Lionel and John Barrymore in 1919.
02:32That was a great success.
02:34That play was also made into an opera by Umberto Giordano in 1924,
02:38the same year as L'Arzegogolo.
02:41L'Arzegogolo, as I mentioned earlier, is set in medieval times.
02:45And the sets that they used, or not even sets, locations, I should say,
02:49they were able to use the so-called medieval village in Turin,
02:52which is a recreation, a 19th century creation of a sort of medieval hamlet
02:58and other locations in Piedmont at the time that really were of the era.
03:03The costumes, one of the great things about this film for me are the costumes by Caramba,
03:08a studio, a costume studio best known for their very elaborate opera productions
03:14and theatre productions, and you'll certainly take note of those.
03:18It's a film that's also full of humour, which tends to be forgotten when people mention,
03:23first of all, Italia Almirante, who was wonderful in comedy.
03:28The reviews when it came out were extraordinary in Italy.
03:32The Italians were saying that it's truly approximating the character of Benelli's work,
03:39so that was a very difficult thing to arrive at, but even outside.
03:45And there's a marvellous review when it was finally released in the Netherlands,
03:49I think in 1927, where the writer talks about how Italian cinema used to be something
03:56that everyone looked forward to.
03:58This is, remember, in 1927 he's writing.
04:00Used to be something everyone looked forward to,
04:02but had declined so much over the last few years,
04:06since basically the end of the First World War,
04:08that he was arriving at the cinema with dread.
04:11He was expecting an absolutely lousy film,
04:14and instead he was amazed at how much he loved the movie,
04:18at what a revelation it was for him.
04:20And that's an important thing also to remember,
04:22that we have this prejudice about cinema in Italy after the First World War.
04:26The accepted wisdom is that the Italian cinema industry collapsed,
04:30which is true to an extent,
04:32but they still were able to make wonderful films,
04:34and still make films that had enormous budgets,
04:37like this one, as you'll see.
04:39I do also want to very quickly point out,
04:41there's an extraordinary scene with a lot of rats.
04:44It's a big banquet scene,
04:46there are hundreds and hundreds of rats.
04:50Unfortunately, after it was over,
04:51apparently one of the main actors,
04:52he had to take to his bed for days and days,
04:56because every time he closed his eyes,
04:57all he could see were rats running all over him,
04:59and as you'll understand once you see the film,
05:03it's a very, very bizarre and yet funny scene.
05:07I think the Dutch critic talking about it as a revelation is actually appropriate.
05:12Speaking of Dutch,
05:13we're also preceding the film by a lovely phantom tram ride,
05:17as we've been doing for several of the others.
05:19That is also from the Netherlands,
05:21so thank you to iFilm Museum for that film,
05:23and also thank you especially to the wonderful music of Stephen Horn.
05:28Enjoy the screening and see you soon.
