by Luciano Emmer, Italy 2000, 42'
| EDITING: Luciano Emmer | MUSIC: Roman Vlad | |
| SCRIPT AND VOICE-OVER: Luciano Emmer | PRODUCTION: RAI Due | |
| PHOTOGRAPHY: Giulio Gianini |
Presented at The Screen of the Arts 2009“I was asked to make a film on the occasion of Picasso’s first exhibition in Italy in 1953. I agreed, with one condition. I wanted to meet Picasso.” (L. Emmer)
Luciano Emmer met Picasso in his studio located in the small town of Vallauris on the southern coast of France. He filmed him at work on a piece for the town’s church. The artwork has since been lost. Emmer has re-edited his original documentary Picasso (1953 - 1954) and modified the original version in order to tell the integral story of his extraordinary meeting with the artist. We present this new version. In it, Emmer introduces some archival material on the two world wars, Roman Vlad’s original score, and substitutes the original voice overs by Renato Guttuso, Antonello Trombadori and Antonio del Guercio with a new commentary written and read by himself.
Luciano Emmer
(Milan, 1918 - Rome, 2009). After moving to Rome to study Law at University, Emmer and his friend Enrico Gras founded a small production house to make art documentaries. He is a pioneer of this genre. Among his most celebrated movies are the ones on Giotto (1939), Piero della Francesca (1949), Goya (1950), Leonardo da Vinci (1952) and Picasso (1953-1954). He made his first feature documentary film Domenica d’agosto in 1950. He worked with scriptwriter Sergio Amidei and with writers such as Vasco Pratolini and Ennio Flaiano to create Parigi è sempre Parigi, (1951), Le ragazze di Piazza di Spagna (1952) and Terza Liceo (1953). After Camilla (1954), Il bigamo (1958) and La ragazza in vetrina (1960), Emmer worked in television and advertising. The 1957 celebrated opening sequence for Carosello was made by him. In the early 1990’s, Emmer returned to movies with Basta! Ci faccio un film, which was presented at the Venice Film Festival. In 2000 he shot Una lunga, lunga, lunga notte d’amore. At the Venice Film Festival in 2003 his L’acqua... il fuoco was previewed. In that year, he received the Premio Pasinetti for Lifetime Achievement. In 2005 the City of Florence awarded him the Lorenzo d’Oro Prize for his contribution to cinema.
Fondazione Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia - Cineteca Nazionale, Roma
www.csc-cinematografia.it