Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to update the font, size and more. To change and reuse text themes, go to Site Styles.
Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to update the font, size and more. To change and reuse text themes, go to Site Styles.
Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to update the font, size and more. To change and reuse text themes, go to Site Styles.
Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to update the font, size and more. To change and reuse text themes, go to Site Styles.
Futuro Antico. Interview with Giacomo Abbruzzese
Jun 6, 2023
Ludovico Pratesi
His latest film, "Disco Boy", won the Silver Bear at the 2023 Berlinale: Giacomo Abbruzzese reflects on the value of distance in approaching things and how history is constantly rewritten, but only by the victors.
What is the project that represents you the most? Can you tell us about its genesis?
A short fiction film, Fireworks, shot in 2010, about a group of eco-terrorists who decide to blow up the Ilva steel plant in Taranto amidst the New Year’s Eve fireworks. At that time, the issue of the steel plant was completely absent at the national level. I wanted the shooting to have a performative and political dimension, so I chose almost all forbidden locations, restricted due to industrial or military regulations. At that time, very little filming was being done in Puglia, so when the police would arrive to chase us away, they were surprised to find an entire film crew on site. I would always ask permission for an adjacent location and pretend we made a mistake. I managed to capture at least one take while the policemen, excited, watched, and in some way, became children again. In Italy, for better or worse, things that are completely improbable are possible. For Fireworks, I also wanted to film an aerial shot over Ilva to somehow show the apocalyptic, atrocious scale of the plant, which is three times the size of the city. In that case, it meant violating both industrial and military secrets, as the whole area was even blurred on Google Maps.
What happened, then?
I asked my cousin, who worked at Ilva, if there was a day when security was more relaxed. He suggested January 1st. So that day, I went to another town in Puglia, rented a helicopter (since drones didn’t exist at the time), and convinced the pilot to report a fake trajectory to the control towers. With a suspended camera attached to the helicopter, we pretended we were off course and flew over the entire steel plant area, filming everything. It’s the shot I’m most proud of, in some way historic: there’s no other archive of this kind. Around the time Fireworks was released in Italy, all the top executives of Ilva were arrested for environmental disaster. Normally, short films get very little attention, but Fireworks became something of a flagship film for the environmental movement in Taranto. Even at midnight screenings, the theater was packed, with Ilva workers in attendance too.
What importance does Genius Loci have in your work?
In cinema, there’s sometimes a tendency to shoot where it’s easiest to park the equipment trucks. The production manager will always try to minimize moves and favor easily accessible locations, and even as a director, you’re the first to want to avoid wasting time with multiple relocations. But for me, locations are as important as the actors. They inspire the mise-en-scène. I always have an abstract idea of the shots I want, but this idea then takes form in a place, in dialogue with its lines, its uniqueness, and with the actors who will inhabit it. The choreography between their movements and those of the camera is deeply connected to the location. That’s why I could never shoot an entire film in a studio. Aside from the mind-numbing boredom of filming in sterile indoor spaces, I think I need the challenge of reality to imagine my mise-en-scène. I start with an abstract framework, which then must somehow embrace reality and face it head-on. The wind, the rain, certain sounds—there are so many things I can’t control, but it’s precisely in this loss of control that the spark of life emerges, the irreducible element, where you lose yourself in something bigger than us. You need a course, and then you need a storm.
How important is the past for imagining and building the future? Do you think the future can have an ancient heart?
Time isn't linear—it has cyclical forms, creating spirals—so there's a continuous contamination between the past and the present. The past exists within the present: in architecture, in thought, in words, in habits. And the dialogue with the past is always in motion. History is constantly rewritten, but almost always by the victors.
What advice would you give to a young person wanting to follow your path?
For about fifteen years, I made roughly one short film a year. With no money, sometimes fifty euros, sometimes two thousand, then ten thousand euros, until reaching larger budgets. That was my real school, teaching me to constantly confront what I wanted to do with reality, learning by myself how to handle the camera, editing, and more. These are skills I still have, and they allow me to think of a film as a whole, with all its components. So, my advice would be to gather a group of friends who share the same passion and make small, self-produced films. And take the time to do things well—think them through as much as possible before shooting, and even during editing, allow time for exploration. To truly see things, you need distance, and this comes not just from space but also from time.
In an era defined by post-truth, does the concept of the sacred still hold importance and power?
If by sacred we mean the invisible dimension loaded with emotions and projections, I believe it’s something immutable in human nature.
How do you imagine the future? Could you give us three ideas that will guide the coming years?
Migration, social injustice, and environmental catastrophe will shape the next twenty years. If we respond as we did to COVID, it's over. Politics today is almost entirely about emergency management—there's a lack of vision and widespread ignorance. Everything is simplified, and complexity is met with disdain and arrogance. People often say that information circulates faster than ever, but there’s hardly any real debate or intersection of perspectives anymore. We are increasingly alone, facing an abyss that grows closer. And there isn't even that lightness, that joy of dancing amidst the bombs. We're so terrified of losing our privileges, our security, that we forget how to live.