7 ms·

Not just abroad. In the latest decades the cultural production of Italy has been, on average, rather embarrassing. As an Italian, I have developed an easy heuri

by blue1 11y ago

Not just abroad. In the latest decades the cultural production of Italy has been, on average, rather embarrassing. As an Italian, I have developed an easy heuristic: if it is an Italian title (either book, song or movie, whatever) it is likely to be bad. Exceptions exist, but they are rare. It is true that what gets exported from a country is usually the best, so one probably encounters the local bad and the foreign best, but cultural production of Italy certainly was better once. It is as if my country has suffered some kind of creative collapse.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
spooningtamarin 11y ago
It's probably corruption. It eliminates competition and breeds mediocrity. If your capital isn't allocated fairly results will be pretty bad.
- simo7 11y ago
  This wouldn't explain why it used to be so good in the past though.
- coldtea 11y ago
  Soviet cinema had lots of masterpieces without "fair allocation of capital" (and lots of corruption one would presume). And I wouldn't call the Hollywood situation of giving multi-million dollar budgets to BS like Transformers and spare change to far better movies a "fair allocation" either when it comes to artistic merit. When it comes to art, allocation of capital and "efficient markets" just means more popular works get more money -- it doesn't say anything about their quality, which is part of what the article is about. (Expecting accusations of 'elitism', I'm not talking about esoteric, self-congratulatory arthouse films either. The Godfellas for example, a mighty good movie, is anything but that, or Pulp Fiction (or, at their era, The Searchers, Vertigo etc.).
  - icebraining 11y ago
    And I wouldn't call the Hollywood situation of giving multi-million dollar budgets to BS like Transformers and spare change to far better movies a "fair allocation" either when it comes to artistic merit. To be fair, the title asks about its appeal, not artistic merit. Transformers is a shitty film, but it certainly has appeal.
illumen 11y ago
Lots of creative Italians in Berlin and London. I reckon that's part of the reason. The climate in the country simply isn't supportive of artists. So they go elsewhere. To much more interesting places, where they can live well, and earn well. As one personal example of someone I know in the industry who left... an Italian who left was not even getting paid for the subtitle translation work she was doing. For something like six months.
- masklinn 11y ago
  There's that, but I'm not sure that's the end of it, France has seen similar decline despite pretty extreme cultural protectionism. Globalisation seems to be more of a "culprit": once upon a time, a country's local cultural production had a semi-captive audience (there was less foreign content and less of it moved from the original country to others, leaving more room for local production) and a much easier time competing (lower budgets, lower technological finesse and lower economies of scale all around). Today, there's more high-production-quality quickly-available content than ever, between more people being able to consume anglo content directly and home-grown sub scenes, international mostly-anglo content is easier than ever to access for individuals, and going the other way it's much harder for local content to break international markets because the accessibility is much lower the other way around, which means it's harder for local content to recoup the same production budgets.
  - illumen 11y ago
    Yes, there is definitely more 'content' available now. Also a lot more Italians are speaking English. Paris is an even worse place for artists to live and work. Make things affordable for artists, and artists won't leave. Society is much better when you have artists amongst your midst. When a media baron runs the country (like in Italy), it can't be good for the films being produced. Germany has a license fee twice as much as in Italy. (much Germany cinema is beyond terrible but). The UK also has a higher tv fee.
    - bad_user 11y ago
      Interesting, but on the other hand affordable cities are not the cities that are desired, the price being often a supply and demand relationship. That Paris is an expensive city can only mean that the demand far exceeds the supply. San Francisco for example is amongst the most expensive cities on earth and personally I don't get its allure for software developers, especially given that we can work from anywhere, but it's probably about the potential. Software developers, much like artists, want investors and an audience.
magic_beans 11y ago
Elena Ferrante is the huge exception.
rurban 11y ago
Not at all. The creative collapse which caused this decline only happened in the 80ies as everywhere else but lasted until 2000, longer than everywhere else. It happened to kill the major italian studios and producers de Laurentiis and Carlo Ponti. Cinecittà went almost bankrupt 1997. Scorcese almost killing off again Cinecittà with his fatal Gangs of New York epic didn't help, Passion of Christ and the fire in a big Cinecittà hall 2007 neither. But since 2000 Italian cinema is the most exciting in Europe again. They are the only ones who successfully experiment in new visual aesthetic with the new available camera technology. It's not only Paolo Sorrentini (Camera: Luca Bigazzi) * L'uomo in più (2001) * Le conseguenze dell'amore (2004) * L'amico di famiglia (2006) * Il Divo (2008) and then his famous ones, but also Zapruder Filmmakersgroup (Nadia Ranocchi, David Zamagni, Camera: Monaldo Moretti) with "All Inclusive 3D" (2010), Luca Guadagnino, Salvatore Maira, Michelangelo Frammartino and in the last years many more. Compare it e.g. to the current decline of the french movies. The directors with which the decline of the Italian cinema started were Gianno Amelio, Guiseppe Tornatore, Roberto Benigni, Gabriele Salvatores, Franco Zeffirelli and Silvio Soldini. They should rest in piece.
- simonebrunozzi 11y ago
  How do you explain Benigni's Oscar for "Life is beautiful"? Although I would partially agree with you on your opinion about Benigni nonetheless.
  - once-in-a-while 11y ago
    Benigni is a class on its own. I think many folks don't really get what he is really trying to say; you can view his movies with a quarter of a brain, but you need all of your heart!
  - briandear 11y ago
    The exception proves the rule. A blind squirrel and all that.. (Not comparing Benigni to a blind squirrel but modern Italian cinema.)
  - riffraff 11y ago
    Of the ones GP mentioned, Tornatore and Salvatores also won the academy award. Personally, I feel most movie awards are BS, but I do not understand why GP believes these authors are the cause of the "italian cinema decline" in the context of abroad appeal, given they are have actually been rather more successful at it then others.
panettoncino 11y ago
My italian film buff husband is also a bit desperate to find good new movies - there are a lot that leave you wondering how on earth they got funded. Caos Calmo (Quiet Chaos) was fantastic though.

by blue1 11y ago

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

spooningtamarin 11y ago

It's probably corruption. It eliminates competition and breeds mediocrity. If your capital isn't allocated fairly results will be pretty bad.

simo7 11y ago
This wouldn't explain why it used to be so good in the past though.
coldtea 11y ago
Soviet cinema had lots of masterpieces without "fair allocation of capital" (and lots of corruption one would presume). And I wouldn't call the Hollywood situation of giving multi-million dollar budgets to BS like Transformers and spare change to far better movies a "fair allocation" either when it comes to artistic merit. When it comes to art, allocation of capital and "efficient markets" just means more popular works get more money -- it doesn't say anything about their quality, which is part of what the article is about. (Expecting accusations of 'elitism', I'm not talking about esoteric, self-congratulatory arthouse films either. The Godfellas for example, a mighty good movie, is anything but that, or Pulp Fiction (or, at their era, The Searchers, Vertigo etc.).
- icebraining 11y ago
  And I wouldn't call the Hollywood situation of giving multi-million dollar budgets to BS like Transformers and spare change to far better movies a "fair allocation" either when it comes to artistic merit. To be fair, the title asks about its appeal, not artistic merit. Transformers is a shitty film, but it certainly has appeal.

illumen 11y ago

Lots of creative Italians in Berlin and London. I reckon that's part of the reason. The climate in the country simply isn't supportive of artists. So they go elsewhere. To much more interesting places, where they can live well, and earn well. As one personal example of someone I know in the industry who left... an Italian who left was not even getting paid for the subtitle translation work she was doing. For something like six months.

masklinn 11y ago
There's that, but I'm not sure that's the end of it, France has seen similar decline despite pretty extreme cultural protectionism. Globalisation seems to be more of a "culprit": once upon a time, a country's local cultural production had a semi-captive audience (there was less foreign content and less of it moved from the original country to others, leaving more room for local production) and a much easier time competing (lower budgets, lower technological finesse and lower economies of scale all around). Today, there's more high-production-quality quickly-available content than ever, between more people being able to consume anglo content directly and home-grown sub scenes, international mostly-anglo content is easier than ever to access for individuals, and going the other way it's much harder for local content to break international markets because the accessibility is much lower the other way around, which means it's harder for local content to recoup the same production budgets.
- illumen 11y ago
  Yes, there is definitely more 'content' available now. Also a lot more Italians are speaking English. Paris is an even worse place for artists to live and work. Make things affordable for artists, and artists won't leave. Society is much better when you have artists amongst your midst. When a media baron runs the country (like in Italy), it can't be good for the films being produced. Germany has a license fee twice as much as in Italy. (much Germany cinema is beyond terrible but). The UK also has a higher tv fee.
  - bad_user 11y ago
    Interesting, but on the other hand affordable cities are not the cities that are desired, the price being often a supply and demand relationship. That Paris is an expensive city can only mean that the demand far exceeds the supply. San Francisco for example is amongst the most expensive cities on earth and personally I don't get its allure for software developers, especially given that we can work from anywhere, but it's probably about the potential. Software developers, much like artists, want investors and an audience.

magic_beans 11y ago

Elena Ferrante is the huge exception.

rurban 11y ago

Not at all. The creative collapse which caused this decline only happened in the 80ies as everywhere else but lasted until 2000, longer than everywhere else. It happened to kill the major italian studios and producers de Laurentiis and Carlo Ponti. Cinecittà went almost bankrupt 1997. Scorcese almost killing off again Cinecittà with his fatal Gangs of New York epic didn't help, Passion of Christ and the fire in a big Cinecittà hall 2007 neither. But since 2000 Italian cinema is the most exciting in Europe again. They are the only ones who successfully experiment in new visual aesthetic with the new available camera technology. It's not only Paolo Sorrentini (Camera: Luca Bigazzi) * L'uomo in più (2001) * Le conseguenze dell'amore (2004) * L'amico di famiglia (2006) * Il Divo (2008) and then his famous ones, but also Zapruder Filmmakersgroup (Nadia Ranocchi, David Zamagni, Camera: Monaldo Moretti) with "All Inclusive 3D" (2010), Luca Guadagnino, Salvatore Maira, Michelangelo Frammartino and in the last years many more. Compare it e.g. to the current decline of the french movies. The directors with which the decline of the Italian cinema started were Gianno Amelio, Guiseppe Tornatore, Roberto Benigni, Gabriele Salvatores, Franco Zeffirelli and Silvio Soldini. They should rest in piece.

simonebrunozzi 11y ago
How do you explain Benigni's Oscar for "Life is beautiful"? Although I would partially agree with you on your opinion about Benigni nonetheless.
- once-in-a-while 11y ago
  Benigni is a class on its own. I think many folks don't really get what he is really trying to say; you can view his movies with a quarter of a brain, but you need all of your heart!
- briandear 11y ago
  The exception proves the rule. A blind squirrel and all that.. (Not comparing Benigni to a blind squirrel but modern Italian cinema.)
- riffraff 11y ago
  Of the ones GP mentioned, Tornatore and Salvatores also won the academy award. Personally, I feel most movie awards are BS, but I do not understand why GP believes these authors are the cause of the "italian cinema decline" in the context of abroad appeal, given they are have actually been rather more successful at it then others.

panettoncino 11y ago

My italian film buff husband is also a bit desperate to find good new movies - there are a lot that leave you wondering how on earth they got funded. Caos Calmo (Quiet Chaos) was fantastic though.