Prepared for a peculiar lesson in European historical past, which the Rotterdam movie pageant is serving up this weekend? Following World Battle I and the disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, each Italy and the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, which later grew to become Yugoslavia, laid declare to town of Fiume, now often known as Rijeka in Croatia. The Paris Peace Convention proposed handing town to what would later grow to be Yugoslavia. However negotiations over the way forward for town in 1919 had been interrupted when on Sept. 12 a power of Italian nationalists led by Italian poet, aristocrat, and armed forces officer Gabriele D’Annunzio ended up occupying it for 16 months.
As a result of the Italian authorities didn’t need to annex Fiume and break worldwide obligations, D’Annunzio and his devoted ultimately established what they dubbed the Italian Regency of Carnaro.
Author and director Igor Bezinović (A Temporary Tour) grew up within the metropolis and revisits the native experiment that came about at a time of nascent fascism in his new film by way of a mixture of dramatic re-enactments and reconstructions with the assistance of Rijeka’s residents, historic photographs and pictures, and documentary parts. The hybrid movie Fiume o morte!, which interprets as Rijeka or Dying!, will get its world premiere within the Tiger Competitors of the Worldwide Movie Pageant Rotterdam (IFFR) on Sunday.
D’Annunzio is probably not a family title world wide however he left a giant mark on town and was given a state funeral by Italian fascist chief Benito Mussolini. And in 1920, the Italian group of New York Metropolis organized a Fiume Day at Metropolis School Stadium in New York on Fiume Day to rejoice the anniversary of the occupation of town, with Enrico Caruso singing on the event.
“Combining archive footage, informative documentary interludes, interviews with solid members and dramatic reconstructions that seize the spirit of the period, Fiume o morte! grapples with the ultranationalist views that underpinned D’Annunzio’s actions,” reads an IFFR synopsis. “Removed from a traditional historical past lesson, it interrogates how the previous informs the current, reflecting on the persistence of extremist ideologies in up to date society.” One interviewee featured within the movie even notes: “They’re nonetheless round at the moment, sadly. We simply don’t know who they’re.”
Try a trailer for Fiume o morte! right here.
The interval in historical past that it dissects wasn’t significantly lengthy however it was actually colourful. “There’s this quote from (Italian poet and filmmaker) Pier Paolo Pasolini who mentioned that it was ‘a narcissistic escapade.’ So he says that it was like a clownery,” Bezinović tells THR. “D’Annunzio is a dictator, however you notice that he’s a bizarre dictator. He’s like Joker from Batman. He’s this type of a villain who you realize is tremendous clever and he’s tremendous humorous and witty, however on the identical time you’re actually afraid of him.”
There’s a motive why he selected a hybrid method for the film. “It’s like a historical past lesson however retold in a enjoyable means,” he explains. “In highschool, I didn’t like historical past that a lot as a result of I didn’t have storyteller, and historical past is principally in regards to the artwork of telling a narrative. You may mix storytelling with info, and it doesn’t should be terribly boring. It may be enjoyable.”
The filmmaker additionally sees the story as a common one given the rise of populism in politics world wide.
“For the American viewers, I believe parallels between Trump and D’Annunzio might be so apparent,” he argues, for instance. D’Annunzio additionally used what was often known as “the Roman salute” as a part of his political theatrics that laid the groundwork for Mussolini’s mannerisms lengthy earlier than the current controversy round a gesture by Trump advisor and mogul Elon Musk.
Given folks’s totally different takes on historical past and the truth that there are lots of items to this historic puzzle, Bezinović lets totally different folks play D’Annunzio and performance as narrators all through Fiume o morte! “You may understand t D’Annunzio in lots of potential methods. I don’t need to serve you an final
fact,” he shares. “I thought of it as a really formidable puzzle. Once we had been enhancing the movie, it was enhancing on 4 ranges: there was the historic degree telling the story; one other degree is reconstructions; the third degree is the interchanging of actors taking part in D’Annunzio; and the fourth degree is the altering of the narrators. If you happen to watch the movie for a second time, you’ll perhaps discover that each one these narrators are additionally taking part in within the movie. And there are such a lot of issues occurring within the movie that you simply principally can’t observe all 4 strains on the identical time, however your thoughts simply drifts.”
‘Fiume o morte!’
Courtesy of Worldwide Movie Pageant Rotterdam
That’s deliberate. “My nice editor Hrvoslava Brkušić, that is the third characteristic that we labored on collectively, actually did a tremendous job with this parallelism,” the filmmaker says. “While you exit the cinema, you come out with a sense. And we wish you to hold out the sensation that you simply noticed one thing advanced and large.” In spite of everything, historical past and life are additionally advanced. “Let’s not all the time see simplicity as a worth,” he urges.
Talking of advanced, or sophisticated, issues. What was the connection between D’Annunzio and Mussolini? “When Mussolini got here to energy, he principally, as we present within the movie, let D’Annunzio purchase a villa for not a giant amount of cash,” explains Bezinović. “He lives in that villa, however he’s principally remoted from official Italian politics as a result of Mussolini doesn’t need to be a fascist duce with one other fascist duce elsewhere.”
However whether or not the Fiume chief must be known as a fascist is a matter of debate in Italy as a result of “he by no means enrolled the fascist official fascist get together,” he notes. “However he was saved by the fascists as a non secular chief. He’s a heavy nationalist, he’s an imperialist, he desires to beat the Jap Adriatic and makes use of navy power. And for me, these parts are fairly sufficient to name an individual a fascist.”
Fairly just a few photographs and their re-enactments featured within the movie are of younger males and sometimes on seashores. That’s as a result of a slew of them got here from Italy and had little to do over the summer time following the occupation. “It’s a narrative that doesn’t actually have a transparent narrative. Some see it as one thing heroic, however from my perspective, it’s a navy occupation. But in addition, it’s 10,000 younger guys coming with weapons. So what I used to be fascinated by whereas studying about this story was the truth that that they had a lot enjoyable. It’s additionally clear that the residents didn’t have that a lot enjoyable, however the troopers did. It’s loopy.”
Bezinović says greater than 10,000 photographs had been taken, and “they principally continued taking photographs on the seashores.” Some experiences of the interval although declare that the younger males consumed cocaine and had been “nude on a regular basis and having orgies,” the writer-director notes. “I merely discover it a horrible exaggeration, as a result of while you enter the archives, you notice that it’s very exhausting to seek out anecdotes about coke. Yow will discover virtually nothing on nudity. There’s one single picture of a nude particular person” posing as Poseidon within the sea, which exhibits up within the movie. “However for that image, which is an iconic picture of the occupation, it’s not even verified that it was taken in Rijeka.” Concluded the filmmaker: “This concept of Fiume as this new paradise is solely not true.”
‘Fiume o morte!’
Courtesy of Worldwide Movie Pageant Rotterdam
One recurring character of the movie is Krissa, D’Annunzio’s beloved greyhound. “There’s a picture of D’Annunzio in his residence wherein he’s surrounded by 10 or 15 greyhounds. He was obsessive about canines,” explains Bezinović, additionally sharing: “Animals are extraordinarily vital in my movies. Someone seen that in my earlier shorts and likewise fiction work you all the time have some animal passing via. So on this case, I actually needed to have the canine. By the best way, his title is Bob. He’s the greyhound of my mom’s finest pal, and he’s a male, whereas Krissa was a feminine. We even have a platypus and a lady carrying a bit pet. I selected all of the photographs that had some animals in them. I intentionally needed to have them within the movie.”
The artistic additionally highlights the non-public significance of the mission. “I needed to make a movie about my metropolis and about historical past. It was my life mission as a result of it concerned my residence metropolis and a lot work on so many ranges,” says Bezinović. “We’re inviting you to this sport. If you wish to have enjoyable with us, soar on board. However I wouldn’t be stunned in any respect if some folks in Italy will say that it’s a falsification of historical past, though it’s fully based mostly on info.”
The filmmaker has yet another factor he desires to emphasise. “I wouldn’t spend all these years making this movie if I used to be simply making a movie a few loopy dictator. What I needed to do is to inform a narrative about Rijeka that some folks in my metropolis will be capable to retell to the following generations. Some child in highschool will lastly be capable to study this story about our metropolis that I didn’t have the chance to study. And perhaps some sociology or historical past academics will simply play this movie and say, ‘Oh, it is a movie {that a} man made about our metropolis a few years in the past. He’s not with us anymore, however let’s see the movie. That will be the largest reward.”