From the "On The Scene" Archives:

by A. G. Basoli

September 5th - Day Five. Allen at his best: Sweet and Lowdown

Went to sleep at four woke up at seven. Today the Lido was teeming with tourists. Sunday on the Lido is a zoo.

Caught the 1 pm premiere of Woody Allen's "Sweet and Lowdown." Allen never comes, but he sends the films almost every year. He's a Venice tradition. Two years ago it was "Deconstructing Harry," last year "Celebrity." "Sweet and Lowdown," a faux documentary à la "Zelig" about the rise and fall of wild and eccentric jazz guitar-meister Emmet Ray (Sean Penn) is Allen at his best according to audiences here. For sure the two leads Sean Penn and Samantha Morton (Emmet's true love Hattie) are sensational, particularly Penn. I think Sean Penn should win the Oscar -- there, I've said it. The rest is politics.

September 6th - Day Six. Outrageous Harmony and Lion Contenders.

Low-tide on the Lido. The tourists are all gone and everything is quiet except for the buzz on Harmony Korine's "julien donkey-boy," which screened today for the press. Italian journalists are still debating whether Korine is the enfant terrible or enfant prodigy of American Indies. Either way they can't stop talking about him.

"julien donkey-boy" is a visual tour de force: one striking image after the other. Largely improvised by a cast that included "Trainspotting's" Ewen Bremmner in the title role, Chloe Sevigny and Werner Herzog, the story itself, about a disturbed young man who works as an attendant in a school for the blind, is hardly relevant compared to the way Korine chooses to tell it. Subverting conventional narrative by ways of visual technology, from freezing and superimposing shots in the "camera" to gliding the camera over Polaroids and other relatively low-tech techniques, the images extract the film's dramatic arc and emotional center from the inner turmoil expressed by the characters.

"Celebration's" director of photography Anthony Dod Mantle originally shot "julien donkey-boy" in digital video. The film was then transferred to 16mm reversal stock and finally blown up to 35mm for a richly textured and lyrical image quality unlike any I've seen on film, video or transfer. Undoubtedly, the film has its flaws and more than a few people left during the screening. I myself was tempted to walk on a couple of occasions. However, even as the film borders pretentiousness, it does so with such energy and originality that in the end I was more intrigued with seeing it through to the end than dismissing it altogether. I'm glad I stayed.

I felt guilty about skipping so many of the films in competition, so I caught up with some of them today: Zhang Yimou's "Not One Less" and Lasse Hallstrom's much anticipated "The Cider House Rules" based on John Irving's best-selling novel. I had never seen any of Zhang Yimou's films. Of course I knew about "Raise the Red Lantern," "Ju Dou" and "The Shanghai Triad," but for some reason I had not made the connection with this film. So basically my mind was open as I wandered into the 5:45 screening like an innocent, without any preconceived notions. Except that when the movie's opening sequence rolled over a sweeping rural landscape steeped in yellows and deep autumnal hues, the image, delicate as it was, had so much power that I thought: "Oh, the director must be a master!" Turns out he is. There's nothing like going to see a movie that you know absolutely nothing about and being totally blown away by what you experience. The same cannot be said about "The Cider House Rules."

Golden Lion contenders at this point are "The Wind will Carry Us," by Iranian Abbas Kiarostami, some say Jane Campion's "Holy Smoke. "

September 7th - Day Seven. Stats.

The Festival's press office graciously passed around a release today with the latest news on audience and press attendance figures for the Festival's 1999 edition. As of September 4th ticket sales increased by 29% compared to the '98 festival grossing an estimated 300 million Lire (approx. $150,000). Foreign press in attendance was up by 25% with a total of 2,400 journalists of which 1,242 were Italian and 861 were foreign.

Out of curiosity I went to the official screening of "julien donkey-boy." Audience reaction was strong. When the lights came up several loud and indignant catcalls and boos were heard among the warm enthusiastic applause.

September 8th - Day Eight. Italian Cinema and "Seventeen Years"

Today was my day with Italian Cinema. How's Italian Cinema doing these days? Not great, but the wind is changing. A lot of Italian films are screening today: Maurizio Zaccaro's "A Respectable Man," based on a true story of Enzo Tortora, an Italian TV host who was wrongly accused of dealings with the Neapolitan organized crime; Gianni Zanasi's comedy "'till Tomorrow;" Luca Guadagnino's "The Protagonists" with Tilda Swinton; and Davide Ferrario's "Look at Me" loosely based on the life and death of Italian porno star Moana Pozzi.

In the morning I went to the preview presentation of "The Lost Lover," a new film produced by "Life is Beautiful"'s Elda Ferri. Veteran Italian Director Roberto Faenza directs the eclectic English-speaking cast in a potentially explosive film based on Abraham Yehoshua's novel "The Lover," about a pair of star-crossed lovers in the Holy Land: he's Arab, she's Jewish. Producer Ferri seems to enjoy the challenge. After all, she is no stranger to controversy, as proven by last year's "Life is Beautiful." Over brunch we chatted a bit, I wanted to know what were her thoughts in the aftermath of "Life is Beautiful."

"The overwhelming success of 'Life is Beautiful,'" she said, "has to be analyzed correctly. I feel that in Italy there is a tendency to conceive cinema as 'entertainment only.' I agree with that. Cinema is entertainment. But I like to produce films with important themes, films that don't shun the more pressing issues of our society. Cinema is perhaps the best medium to put them in a clear light to attempt a resolution."

Caught Giuseppe Bertolucci's "The Sweet Noise of Life." Giuseppe Bertolucci is Bernardo's older, less famous brother, well known in Italy as a theater director and screenwriter, as well as filmmaker. He wrote "Novecento" and "The Moon" for Bernardo and three of Benigni's best known early films. He's the one who gave Benigni his start. The film is beautiful! Young woman finds abandoned infant on a train and decides to keep him. As time goes by, she uses the child to retaliate on ex-lover by making him believe the child is his son. More time goes by and the son, in a desperate attempt to find the man he believes to be his father, flees to the northern town where his biological mother originally abandoned him. Enter real mother. I know, I'm a sucker for melodrama!

Also saw "Seventeen Years," by Chinese director Zangh Yuan which was financed partially with Italian funds and co-produced by Fabrica. It's a powerful story about a young girl who kills her step-sister in a fit of rage and comes home after serving time for seventeen years. Superb acting, interesting story device towards the end. A lot of the films I'm seeing have very strong female roles.