The Villanova Monteleone Award 2017 for the Best Italian Documentary goes to “The Funeral” by Filippo Biagianti and Ruben Lagattolla. A reportage filmed in India in 2016, and presented as a premiere at the Sardinia Film Festival, to tell about the great divide and the deep contradictions that characterize the Caste system in the Indian society. The story of a denied funeral in a community of Dalit farmers, the so-called “out-of-caste”, is a small episode that highlights an apartheid regime that involves almost 250 million people.
At the prize-giving ceremony, hosted by Rachele Falchi on Saturday evening in Piazza Piero Arru, also attended the Mayor of Villanova, Quirico Meloni and the artistic director of the Festival Carlo Dessì, together with the members of the different juries.
“The festival only accept Sardinian Premieres but, year after year, also the number of Italian and even world-wide premiere increases” the organizers explained. “This means that more and more authors take into consideration the Villanova Monteleone Award as a showcase for the launch of their work”.
With a unanimous agreement, the technical committee composed of Lorenzo Hendel (professor of direction), Davide Bini (professor of direction) and Giommaria Monti (television author, Rai), acknowledged “The Funeral” the merit of having faced a complex subject , without rhetorical artifact, with a disconcerting contrast between the live testimonies and the dramatic shots of real events. The Special Mention went to “Inner me” by Antonio Spanò, a short movie realized in Congo between crowded markets, slaughterhouses, kilns and bats hunters. It is a film that cleverly focuses on “the triple marginalization” that women, the disabled and the poor undergo in a context in which they are considered last among the last. These three conditions are all embodied by the protagonists of the video, united by the strong desire to grasp each morning the uncertain threads of their fate.
To win the Prize of the Young Jury, composed by girls and boys from Villanova, was instead “Irregulars” by Fabio Palmieri, for telling the tragedy of an immigration story through a metaphor using mannequins, whose lack of identity increases the sense of drama of reality.
The Special Mention of the Young Jury went to the Sardinian directors Alessandro Mirai and Fabian Volti for their work “R-Esistenze”, a report on the disasters caused by the industrial pollution in Porto Torres, a reality that, although it is a few kilometres from us, is too often neglected and almost forgotten. The protagonists are at the same time actors and spectators of this dimension.
A large crowd followed the final appointment of the kermesse in Piazza Generale Casula: the tribute to Rino Gaetano, an acoustic concert performed by Alessandro Azara and his team.