Locarno’s Director on His Love of Celluloid, Building a Community Around “the Pleasure of Cinema”

The Locarno Worldwide Movie Competition likes to name itself the “world capital of auteur cinema,” and whereas the Swiss occasion can’t declare the star energy or trade heft of Cannes, Venice or Toronto, in the case of the celebration of pure cinema, Locarno has few friends.

For the 77th Locarno fest, which runs Aug. 7-17, creative director Giona A. Nazzaro has once more lined up an eclectic mixture of established arthouse faves — new movies from Hong Sang-soo, Christoph Hochhäusler, Radu Jude and others — alongside function debuts and experimental shorts, and a bespoke choice of viewers favourite from Cannes, together with Laetitia Dosch’s Canine on Trial, Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig, and Claude Barras’ animated function Savages.

However the movies alone aren’t what makes Locarno distinctive. It’s the presentation. The first attraction is the Piazza Grande, the primary sq. within the Swiss mountain city, which is was an 8,000-seat open-air cinema through the pageant. As a spot to observe the world premiere of Gianluca Jodice’s French revolution drama Le Déluge (Locarno’s opening night time movie), the 4K restored director’s reduce of Tarsem Singh’s The Fall, or the Italian dubbed model of E.T. (half of the pageant’s tribute to the movie’s sound designer, Ben Burtt), it’s exhausting to beat.

Forward of Locarno’s 2024 version, creative director Giona A. Nazzaro spoke to The Hollywood Reporter about breaking down the borders “that should not exist” between arthouse and style cinema, the “no-brainer” tributes to Burtt and indie producing legend Stacey Sher, and his timeless love of analog cinema.

How do you see your job, as Locarno’s pageant director? What are you making an attempt to do?

In a nutshell, I hope to construct a group. The general expertise of Locarno is a component of this community-building course of. The movies are on the heart, on the edges, above and under this expertise, however in the beginning, it’s about constructing a group via the totally different gaze on the movies that we share and, I hope, the other ways of referring to the filmmaking course of and the sharing of movie heritage.

It’s additionally about maintaining the inventive filmmaking course of, about displaying filmmakers that may convey their tasks, their movies, right here and so they gained’t be pigeonholed. If you wish to convey your inventive documentary right here, you are able to do so. If you wish to convey your style movie, you are able to do that as effectively. Over the previous 4 years we’ve had success with movies from Radu Jude’s [Romanian social satire] Do Not Count on Too A lot From the Finish of the World to Canadian filmmaker Rob Jabbaz’s The Disappointment [a Taiwanese body horror movie]. My thought shouldn’t be solely to seek out and help movies for our Locarno group but additionally open up some of the borders between movie genres and movie communities, which I believe shouldn’t exist.

Do you’re feeling this movie group is below risk, particularly now with individuals watching films on streaming companies, curated by algorithms?

To be clear: Locarno shouldn’t be about streaming content material. That doesn’t imply that platforms can’t help inventive filmmaking, however what we’re about is about experiencing movies in a movie show with a group. We’re additionally huge followers of movie, which means 35-millimeter, 16-millimeter celluloid. This yr, we’ve got virtually 40 prints that we’re displaying, restored new prints and prints on mortgage from cinema archives. We’ll be opening [in a pre-screening event Aug. 4] with a 35mm screening on the Piazza, an Italian model of E.T., which might be a homage to sound designer Ben Burtt [receipiant of this year’s Locarno Vision Award]. It’s a particular providing for the youngsters in Locarno. For me, it is extremely essential, additionally symbolically, that after we open the Piazza, for the very first screening, that we will hear the sound of the projector, the damage and tear, that we will see the sunshine going as much as the display screen. You can’t cease know-how, and we don’t intend to. I took a practice yesterday and noticed a lady watching one thing on her telephone, sobbing. Emotion lives on, nonetheless it’s conveyed – be it telephone or platform. However I’m the creative director of a movie pageant, so we try to talk movie, to talk cinema. We try to champion that very particular expertise.

However we’re not residing in some nostalgic bubble. My colleague, Marcus Duffner from the trade aspect of Locarno, Locarno Professional, might be presenting a number of talks and keynotes this yr on the use of A.I. and one of the movies within the official program is a film made solely utilizing synthetic intelligence. What I’m making an attempt to say is that we’re completely conscious of the world we’re residing in, however on the identical time, we’re movie buffs. We predict movie nonetheless means a lot, particularly to people who find themselves making an attempt to make their first movie, as a result of it’s a very highly effective solution to share concepts, to convey your concepts concerning the world. So going again to your first query, the thought is to create a group the place individuals, whether or not they’re making their first brief movie, making an attempt to get their first function off the bottom, can take a look at Locarno and see that there are like-minded individuals who would welcome their work.

Is that concept of group behind your new collaboration with film fan social media website Letterboxd, together with the brand new Letterboxd award?

As a cinephile, I’m actually passionate about this collaboration with Letterboxd, as a result of after I log in to Letterboxd, I see the keenness about movies from individuals which can be discovering movies I noticed means again within the day, individuals are championing their style for sluggish cinema, for documentaries from the ’70s, no matter. It’s a very erudite group that is aware of what they’re doing and is aware of what they like. They’ve very refined tastes. Even when it comes right down to extra C-grade movies or style movies, there’s at all times this very acute understanding of what a movie is. And I believe the collaboration with Letterboxd is extraordinarily helpful for a pageant like Locarno. We hope it can have each a horizontal attain, which means that it’s going to convey Locarno to those that wouldn’t have heard of or come to us in any other case, and likewise a vertical integration, so that folks within the Letterboxd group may be involved in collaborating in Locarno occasions that exist exterior the 11 days of the bodily pageant, like our Open Doorways program [which supports filmmakers from under-represented regions around the world], like our residency program for individuals within the trade. I’m hoping it may possibly snowball in a very inventive and constructive means.

Wanting over this yr’s program, what stunned you in phrases of surprising themes or topics linking the flicks in your 2024 lineup?

Thanks for the query, as a result of often after I get requested if there are crimson threads working via the choice, I say “no.” However this yr, possibly as a result of of the occasions we live it, there are some themes that you just would possibly say are transversal, that reduce diagonally via the choice. Firstly, is the theme of the concern of an authoritarian world. You may see it in movies about households, movies about establishments, movies about relationships that develop into tyrannical, and so on.

One other theme that we understand was fairly essential is A.I., within the sense of what does it imply to be human people, inventive individuals, when there may be custom-made software program that may take out every part that we’re or assume we’re, and do it higher?

One other apparent theme is the dialog across the previous feminist feminine id and the totally different declinations of such id within the current. I don’t need to do any mansplaining, however we’ve got felt that that is a big factor entering into a totally different route proper now, with the queer sensibility, the LGBTQ+ sensibility, this complete post-feminist gender dialog could be very of the second. You may see that significantly within the brief movies we’ve chosen, the place these parts pop up. But additionally in competitors with Salve Maria, the brand new movie by [Spanish director] Mar Coll, about a lady, a new mom, who turns into obsessive about a case of infanticide and she or he begins questioning her id as a lady, as a mom, and what’s anticipated from her.

That is tied to a different theme going via the pageant choice: ‘What does it mean to have a family today? What does it mean to relate to a family?’ A movie like Transamazonia by Pia Marais [about a daughter of missionaries growing up in the Amazon], asks this query in a very difficult means.

I seen you’re screening Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig, which premiered at Cannes and could be very a lot about how an authoritarian society infects a household.

Sure, however we even have the Turkish movie New Daybreak Fades by Gürcan Keltek, which we’re displaying within the Concorso part. It’s a very psychedelic mystique movie about a younger particular person going via Istanbul, however slowly you perceive that town is remodeling itself, that the society is altering.

One other movie that performs with this theme is The Sparrow within the Chimney [by Swiss director Ramon Zürcher], in competitors, which offers with a household that’s on the verge of both exploding or imploding. It’s one other movie the place household and society overlap and mix into one another. Or there’s the Hungarian movie Classes Discovered [director Bálint Szimler’s feature debut]. Right here it’s a college which turns into the theater of what’s dysfunctional in society, with a younger little one who can’t adapt to the authoritarian methods by which the varsity is run. As a result of authoritarianism doesn’t imply that issues work, that the trains are on time, it merely implies that you can be thwarted as a person.

There’s a movie from Tunisia, Crimson Path, by Lotfi Achour, which tells the sadly true story of some shepherd children who had been killed by a gang of so-called terrorists, however the query it asks is: How do you reside with this perennial violence — violence to your physique, your group, your id — that you just can’t management and that disrupts your means to dwell your life?

And, of course, there may be our opening movie, Le Déluge by Gianluca Jodice, which offers with the final days of Louis the XVI and Marie Antoinette [played by Guillaume Canet and Mélanie Laurent] when they’re delivered to their palace to await their destiny as a new world dawns. It reminds us that even the idea of the trendy republic was primarily based on that brutal act. You must kill the symbols of the earlier world, it’s important to kill the king and queen, order to have a new world. I’m simply naming a few at random, however it’s a widespread theme.

It’s not like we had been in search of these movies, in search of these themes. It’s solely after you observe again from the acute close-up of the choice that you just get a higher understanding of the entire panorama and you’ll see these threads going via. Nevertheless it was not accomplished on goal.

However deciding on your lifetime honorees was accomplished on goal. One of the surprises was Ben Burtt, the Oscar-winning sound designer on the Star Wars films. His affect on cinema has been immense, however you not often see a sound designer getting honored by a movie pageant.

We’re good buddies with Bernardo Rondeau who works on the Lucas Museum of Narrative Artwork in L.A. and, of course, we knew about Ben Burtt and we began speaking. Clearly, I see the thought of giving the Imaginative and prescient Award to somebody who’s a sound designer, sound editor, may appear unusual, however Ben Burtt is such an affect. On us all! It’s his sounds on everybody’s telephone, on our WhatsApp messages, our ringtones. For years, I had “I am your father” on my telephone every time my son was calling. So I assumed, how can we discover a solution to current what this gentleman has accomplished for all of us and the way influential his work has been? In the long run, it was a no-brainer. While you see what this gentleman has completed, it’s phenomenal. Star Wars wouldn’t be the identical universe with out him.

Your choose for the Raimondo Rezzonico indie producers award, Stacey Sher, producer of Pulp Fiction, Erin Brockovich and Get Shorty, wants much less rationalization.

Positive. That was one other no-brainer. When you say, U.S. impartial cinema of the ’90s, no matter movie touched your emotions, your feelings and your reminiscence, likely, it has Stacey concerned in it. And you may detect her affect. I imply, for me, being a big [Steven] Soderbergh fan, having liked Actuality Bites and clearly bowing on the altar of [Quentin] Tarantino, it was apparent. [French film critic] André Bazin spoke concerning the “la politique des auteurs” however there may be additionally a “politique des producteurs”. Stacey might have accomplished no matter, however she selected her tasks very rigorously, the tasks had been virtually tailored. Her understanding of the zeitgeist was phenomenal, poetic, and by no means cynical.

Generally, you recognize, after we communicate concerning the administrators we love, we neglect that filmmaking is a collective course of. Clearly, there’s somebody’s voice, the filmmaker’s, which must be heard. However when the movie doesn’t exist, when it’s solely a piece of paper, then you definitely want visionary producers like Stacey Sher doing the leap of religion, risking the stability within the checking account, and saying: ‘We are going to do this because I believe it.” If, a year and a half later, you can be in the dark of a cinema with hundreds of people and enjoy a film, it’s as a result of somebody believed in it.

We wished a homage to this act of religion of somebody who supported movies that most likely nobody else would have supported, movies that outlined the occasions during which they had been launched, which isn’t any small accomplishment. There are such a lot of movies which can be being made, however so few that outline our occasions.

Undoubtedly. I discover Ben Burtt is the cinema of my childhood. And Stacey Sher very a lot represents the flicks of my school years, after I first actually started to grasp films…

I’m going to steal that for my subsequent interview. And I’m not going to cite you. I hope that’s OK!

You’re additionally celebrating the centenary of Columbia Footage with a retrospective. Rather a lot of festivals have accomplished related issues just lately as the large studios all flip 100. However you’ve stated you need to give a totally different perspective on the studio’s historical past. How are you planning to do this?

Nicely, the very first thing is that I don’t imagine in “heritage films” as a result of I believe all movies are within the current tense. If this afternoon you watch a movie from the silent period, a masterpiece you’ve by no means seen, you’ll relate it to every part round you at this second. It turns into a up to date movie. That is what we wished to do with Columbia, what we’re making an attempt to do with all our retrospectives. It isn’t concerning the previous, it’s concerning the current. And Columbia was a very fascinating studio. This concept for a retrospective got here collectively very simply with [retrospective curator] Ehsan Khoshbakht. There’s a nice deal of cinematic wealth right here that has been very tapped into. They’ve been restored however festivals by no means display screen them as a result of they’re smaller movies from so-called “lesser” administrators. It isn’t true that we haven’t seen all of these movies. Removed from it. And it’s not true that every part about movie historical past has been stated. There are movies which have by no means been seen and that deserve a likelihood to be seen. Perhaps probably the most well-known movies we’re displaying are [Howard Hawks’ 1934 screwball comedy] Twentieth Century, or Orson Welles’ The Girl From Shanghai (1934). We actually wished to choose films that folks have by no means seen.

And by limiting it to 1929 to 1959, we will focus on the movies below studio boss Harry Cohn, a man that was supposedly a horrible dictator, however who had extremely good style and was so ruthlessly savvy concerning the enterprise that every one the movies that he put his palms on had been good. We’re nonetheless speaking about this work. So I’m not saying that’s condoning something however that is a very fascinating second in historical past that may inform us a lot about cinema as we speak.

We’re celebrating Columbia on one hand, however we’re additionally celebrating the movies of [legendary 1960s avant-garde director] Stan Brakhage. Now, Columbia and Brakhage couldn’t be additional aside, however the thought is mainly the identical. How many individuals as we speak have skilled Brakhage’s movies on movie in a movie show as an alternative of going surfing to seek out if something is on the market?

The factor is, movie has its personal textual custom. It has its personal philology, and all of that is a pleasure to expertise. It’s a pleasure to be uncovered to it. This isn’t a job, it isn’t boring, it’s a pleasure. So the thought, the substance, and the subtext of all of this group constructing is pleasure. Come to Locarno. Let’s have some pleasure collectively.