PICENARDI TOWER – ‘The Time of the Giants’ by Davide Barletti is the winning docufilm of the second edition of the International Festival of Urban Documentary and Environmental Cinema. Barletti, who arrived specially from Puglia, received the award from the president of the jury Dorothea Burato.
The final Grand Gala of the Fiducia Festival took place in recent days at the Soms headquarters in Torre de’ Picenardi. The Special Jury Prize (composed, in addition to Burato, by Pierluigi Bonfatti Sabbioni, Fabio Ceci, Carmine Caletti, Annunciata Camisani And Fabio Guerreschi) was assigned to ‘The Roots of Heaven’ of the director Raffaella Tolicettipresent in the room with the director of photography and editor Giacomo Giorgi. The Audience Award was awarded to ‘Little Big Steve’ by the Swiss director Tiziana Caminada.
An edition that presented 15 docufilms at the starting line (with screenings between November and March) with numerous high-level films in terms of cinematographic value and content. Like ‘The Time of the Giants’ which narrates the impact of the Xylella bacterium on the olive trees of Salento and brings to the fore the conflict between science and politics, which returned forcefully shortly after with the Covid pandemic. «We wanted to tell through the protagonist’s journey the confusion, dismay and bewilderment that Xylella brought with the consequent environmental, economic, social and landscape repercussions – said Barletti, co-director with Lorenzo Conte –. I myself was one of those who tied himself to the olive trees to defend them and avoid being cut down, but then I realized that it was an action that would lead to nothing and that we were not victims of a conspiracy. It was necessary to understand, understand and act rationally. While the perfect storm that was devastating everything had hit us, we were still immersed in divisions and conflicts and hunting for a culprit that we had before our eyes. We were unable to see that new perspectives could be opened up, those that a person who came from far away showed us instead.”
The documentary film that won the Special Jury Prize is instead a successful portrait of the challenges of two brothers, Orestes And Arthurwho write historical pages of mountaineering. Oreste is no longer there and Arturo becomes the narrator, tender, essential and delicate, of a powerful story that comes to life in the climbs to the Alpine and Himalayan peaks to reach the refuge built by the two brothers at 2,600 meters and which becomes «a special place ». «It took us four years – said Tolicetti, director of ‘Alle Radici del cielo’ – to make inroads into Arturo and have the splendid story of him and his brother Oreste told to him».
‘Little Big Steve’ is the documentary film awarded by the public: a story of marginalization and redemption set in a Nairobi slum. Steve studies against his parents’ wishes, after 20 years he is a psychologist and returns to Mathare to help children who suffer abuse of all kinds. «His life is like the documentary film I made about him: constantly evolving. I am always in contact with Steve – said director Caminada – and his educational work continues unabated. Only now has he stopped due to the floods that hit that area of Kenya. From Geneva we are helping him because now the school hosts several families left with nothing.”
