Cinema Classics: Cinema Paradiso

We have the pleasure of inviting you to a screening within the Cinema Classics:

December 17th, 2018, 6 PM
Forum Cinema, 5 Legionowa Street
tickets: 10 PLN (regular ticket), 7 PLN (discount ticket) – available at the Forum cinema’s box office and on bilety.bok.bialystok.pl

Lecture preceding the film: Diana Dąbrowska

Cinema Paradiso / Nuovo Cinema Paradiso
Cinema Paradiso offers a nostalgic look at films and the effect they have on a young boy who grows up in and around the title village movie theater in this Italian comedy drama that is based on the life and times of screenwriter/director Giuseppe Tornatore.

The story begins in the present as a Sicilian mother pines for her estranged son, Salvatore, who left many years ago and has since become a prominent Roman film director who has taken the advice of his mentor too literally. He finally returns to his home village to attend the funeral of the town’s former film projectionist, Alfredo, and, in so doing, embarks upon a journey into his boyhood just after WWII when he became the man’s official son. In the dark confines of the Cinema Paradiso, the boy and the other townsfolk try to escape from the grim realities of post-war Italy. The town censor is also there to insure nothing untoward appears on screen, invariably demanding that all kissing scenes be edited out. One day, Salvatore saves Alfredo’s life after a fire, and then becomes the new projectionist. A few years later, Salvatore falls in love with a beautiful girl who breaks his heart after he is inducted into the military. Thirty years later, Salvatore has come to say goodbye to his life-long friend, who has left him a little gift in a film can.

Diana Dąbrowska – filmologist, PhD student of cultural studies at the Faculty of Philology at the University of Łódź. She teaches Film and Italian Studies. She specializes in the film and music culture of Italy in the 1960s and in the Italian contemporary cinema.