Giona Nazzaro: Last News

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentThe Locarno Film Festival recently announced a complete retro dedicated to Douglas Sirk, 35 years after the death of the director best known for melodramas made in Hollywood in the 1940s and 1950s, such as “Magnificent Obsession” and “Written on the Wind,” that aims to provide a fresh critical interpretation of his work.Sirk, who was born in Denmark and worked in Germany, which he left for Hollywood during Hitler’s rise to power, later returned to Europe and eventually retired in Switzerland.Among his most prominent fans were late great German filmmaker Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Bernardo Bertolucci.For the first time, Sirk’s filmography will be reviewed in the light of unpublished documents made available by the director’s family through the Douglas Sirk Foundation and preserved since 2012 at the Cinémathèque Suisse, broadening the perspective on this major auteur. Variety spoke to Locarno’s artistic director Giona A.

There was a spontaneous singalong, shrieks of “I love you” and the clanking of a cowbell one audience member had brought to remind Shah Rukh Khan of the film he made long ago in the Alps: the Indian megastar’s masterclass at the Locarno Film Festival was the closest Switzerland comes to pandemonium. Facing a capacity crowd at Locarno’s venerable Gran Rex cinema, SRK accepted the adulation and declarations of love with the gracious fan-friendliness that has made him beloved for 35 years.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent Surprise! Legendary director Barbet Schroeder, in Locarno to introduce his latest doc “Ricardo and Painting,” was greeted with a Special Tribute Award before the screening. “Is this for the film?” Shroeder, a modest man, asked on stage. “No,” said Locarno festival director Giona Nazzaro.

Filmmaker Ali Ahmadzadeh is under pressure from Iranian authorities to pull his latest feature Critical Zone from Locarno’s Main Competition after he was summoned to the country’s Ministry of Security.