Abstract Choral voices narrate the tale of Giuseppe Giacosa, poet, playwriter and writer for Giacomo Puccini’s Bohéme, Tosca and Madame Buttefly Librettos. The life and deeds of a man who was born in the “small world of the Canavese region” (r.n.: in Piedmont, Northern Italy), made it to the “big world” of the Arts, and managed to bring this new wider world back into his own country mansion: from Carducci to Boito, from De Amicis to Pascoli, from Sarah Bernhardt to Eleonora Duse, from Puccini to D’Annunzio, the entire “intellighenzia” of his age came round the “Great Ark” (this is how the poet Francesco Pastonchi nicknamed Villa Giacosa in 1906), and left signatures on the porch’s walls, a true “autographs museum”.
Languages Italian, English, French Format DVD. Duration: 35' + 22'
Technical staff Direction and Screenplay: Andrea Tomasetto. Artistic supervision: Sante Altizio. Photography: Antonio Venere. Operators: Diego Fatone and Daniele Titonella. Production: Consiglio Regionale del Piemonte, 2006. Cast Voices: Paola Roman and Claudio Parachinetto. With the participation of: Mauro Avogadro, Giacomo Bottino, Oliviero Corbetta, Guido Davico Bonino, Susanna Franchi, Lucio Gallo, Lido Gedda, Piergiuseppe Gillio, Giorgio Pestelli.
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John Paul II. Almost an autobiography
Abstract The life of Karol Wojtyla told through his sole words and writings. John Paul II outlines a sort of autobiography in which he thinks back to the most significant events of his life and to the ones that truly characterized the second half of the twentieth century. Shown on over 50 broadcasting channels throughout the world.
Languages Italian, English, French, Spanish, German, Polish Format VHS. Duration: 55'
Technical staff Director: Michelangelo Dotta. Screenplay: Mario Durando. Photography: Liborio L'Abbate. Production: Vatican Television Centre, Euphon, NOVA-T, 2000.
Cast Narrating voice: Ferruccio Amendola
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Canticle of the Creatures
Abstract Almost everybody knows Saint Francis of Assisi’s “Canticle of the Creatures”, but only a few know where and when it was composed. Moreover, what was the bottom line message of the Canticle’s creation? This documentary, shot in the very places where Francis of Assisi spent his life, tries to give an answer to all these questions.
Languages Italian, English, French, Spanish, German Format VHS. Duration: 35'
Tecnical staff Director: Paolo Damosso. Photography: Antonio Morabito. Operator: Antonio Venere. Production: NOVA-T, 1997.
Cast Narrating voice: Nando Gazzolo. With the participation of: father Raniero Cantalamessa
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Forgotten wars
Abstract Six episodes dedicated to six African conflicts forgotten by the mass media. Thirty minutes long reportages to recount the intricate reasons behind conflicts which seem irremediable. A journey from Angola to Somalia, from former Zaire to Rwanda, from western Sahara to Etyopia, trying to understand if and how it is possible to put an end to the conflicts. Broadcasted in a dozen countries throughout the world.
Languages Italian, English Format VHS. Six episodes of 30' duration each
Technical staff An idea of Davide Demichelis. With Raffaele Masto and Sante Altizio. Photography: Antonio Morabito e Liborio L'Abbate. Operator: Antonio Venere. Production: NOVA-T, 2002.
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I do not know Abstract Valeria is a police woman, Rita is a nun. They were very close and dear friends as children. After a quarrel and the different choices made while growing up they became estranged. By chance they meet again. In disbelief and profoundly curious, the two try to make up for their long lost and buried friendship. But it’s hard to go beyond the veil and the uniform.
Languages Italian, English, French, Spanish, Arabian Format DVD. Duration: 68'
Technical staff Direction and screenplay: Paolo Damosso. Photography: Franco Boursier. Operators: Antonio Venere e Diego Fatone. Original soundtrack: Pietro Giola, licensed by "Machiavelli Int.". Production: Sisters of Charity of Santa Giovanna Antida Thouret, 2006.
This section collects videotapes and audio-video materials on religious and missionary subjetcs produced or realized by missionary and religious world contexts. The first core of archived material consists of 119 titles shot in about thirty African, South-American, Asian and Oceanian countries. They stretch from the images shot in Patagonia and Land of Fire by don Alberto De Agostini in the first twenty years of the Nineteen hundred, to the fiction films realized by the Saverian missionaris on the Apennine Mountains across Tuscany and Emilia-Romagna transformed into an American-Indian camp at the end of the Twenties, to the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary's documentary made in China in the Fourties immediately before the Maoist revolution. Recently, with over twenty hours of video materials, the Archive of the order of Franciscan Missionaries of Mary was also acquired.
