Girls, do you know who is coming to Calabria at the Magna Magna Film Festival of the legendary GianMelo Casadonte? We could comment like this, taking inspiration from the legendary Rio Mare tuna advertisement, the announcement with great fanfare of thearrival in Catanzaro of the great great actor Kevin Costner.
The commercial, which was subject to all sorts of parodies and mockeries, continues with our protagonist inviting the three local “actresses” to have lunch with him: “girls, will you eat with me?” and the three adoring women asked him: “and why in Italy?”. “Because you have a great kitchen and a great tuna”, exclaims our Costner. “So good you can cut it with a breadstick”.
Here we are certain that if some Calabrian woman, also because she has also aged badly, asked Kevin: “How come in Calabria”, he would calmly answer: “because you have a great kitchen and you eat well”. At this point we recommend not delving into this point further, it is better to remain in the hope that it refers to our typical dishes, the Calabrian soppressata, the ‘nduja, the stuffed aubergines, and does not refer to a very different type of food, food in short.
Kevin Costner will certainly come to the Magna Magna Magna film festival because he was attracted by the prestigious award he received. Someone like him, an Oscar winner, will be able to add the prestigious Golden Column Lifetime Achievement Award at the Magna Graecia Film Festival on his noticeboard. He’s been waiting to fill that hole for years. An award that all Hollywood actors wait and dream of receiving, together with the check for participation.
But this is a minor detail. At the announcement of the presence of Kevin Costner, together with those of Claudio Bisio, Tim Robbins, another Oscar winner, all the hotels in Catanzaro first, then in the province, and finally in the entire region were stormed and recorded sold out in a few minutes. Mayor Nicola Fiorita said he was enthusiastic about the event, and was thrilled to see that the efforts made to keep the Magna Magna Magnum festival in Catanzaro are producing extraordinary results. And while Fiorita celebrates, our great president Robertino Occhiuto thinks about how to create greater synergy around the arrival of Kevin Costner.
A top secret appointment with Anton Giulio Grande is scheduled for the next few days (incidentally, it seems that to enter the president’s magic circle you need to have at least two names that match… Anton Giulio… Gian Vito…) to create a series of new events. The strong idea is to propose the remake of “Dances with Wolves” to Kevin Costner. The set would already be ready, and it is the one built for the remake of Sandokan. With small adjustments, the Labuan recreated in Lamezia Terme can be transformed into Fort Haynes from Dances with Wolves. For the prairies we can use the Sila and we certainly don’t get lost for wolves, she-wolves and cubs. We have plenty of wolves, a thousand times better than the plucked one in the original film. The advice we would like to give to our magical trio, Robertino, Gianvito, Anton Giulio, is to propose a small addition to the name of the film. From Dances with Wolves to Dances with Sila Wolves. But it doesn’t end here, to complete the arrival in Calabria a new tuna advertising spot could be promoted. You’re spoiled for choice, Callipo or Sardanelli? AND SO SOFT, IT CAN BE CUT WITH A BREADSTICK. SO GOOD!
These are ideas that our President Robertino Occhiuto is naturalizing. His days are full of things and events. In recent days he has been busy blocking differentiated autonomy and it seems that faced with his firmness, Meloni and Tajani are about to give in. Furthermore he was involved in the other great Calabrian event, Trame festival of books on the mafia. A spontaneous initiative born over 14 years ago in Lamezia Terme with few resources and means and which today, thanks also to the regional contribution, has been institutionalized and almost quelled. It almost seems, and we hope we are wrong, that it has reached excessive greatness where the very purpose for which it was born is often lost.
There is the danger that it will become a kind of red carpet on which everyone is invited to perform, from Falcomatà, recently investigated by the Reggio DDA, to Roberto Occhiuto, to Wanda Ferro, to the Lametina regional councilor Amalia Bruni, etc., etc. All or almost all. In fact, it seems that a debate was skipped because the expected guest, an anti-mafia historian, gave up because the interlocutor with whom he was supposed to discuss the ‘Ndrangheta was canceled from participation by choice of the festival foundation because he was an inappropriate presence given that Lamezia will vote in 2025. In Rome the level playing field starts a month before the elections. Here a year earlier. We are faced with a long-range Lametina level playing field. An event that if it had happened at Rai, Repubblica and Domani would have made nine-column headlines…
