Our May Sunday Corner With Lee Liberman -- THE ASSASSINATION OF GIANNI VERSACE: American Crime Story

This 9-part FX series (which follows the celebrity of The People vs OJ Simpson of 2/2016) has considerable depth despite initially not comparing favorably with the starry OJ saga, the first in the American Crime Story series produced by Brad Simpson and executive produced by Ryan Murphy, both of whom helmed Glee. It ended up winning an Emmy for best limited series, beating Picasso, Patrick Melrose, and Godless (my favorite) among others. Now on Netflix (the OJ story is too), the Versace case probes issues that merit attention: the role of ‘nurture’ in causing mental illness and the comparatively secretive (except in major cities) gay world of the 1990’s.

Versace, at the height of his fame, was murdered on July 15, 1997, age 50, at the door of his palatial South Beach, FL, villa by Andrew Cunanan, then 27 (Darren Criss, below), who killed himself 8 days later to prevent being taken by police.

The malignant narcissism of this young killer screams for notice in 2019, his mental disorder being flagrant in the person of Donald Trump, whose own version of compulsive lying, self-aggrandizing, and denial of reality is as toxic and and likely more murderous (if not one-on-one with a gun) than Cunanan’s. (Below, Darren Criss, l, Andrew Cunanan high school photo, r.)

The series title deceives in that The Assassination of Gianni Versace is not a biopic of the designer; it is Andrew Cunanan’s story ending in five murders during a several-month killing spree. Screenwriter Tom Rob Smith (London Spy) used journalist Maureen Orth’s 1999 book, Vulgar Favors, about Cunanan, as a source. Smith, however, used the life and career of Versace to contrast the youth of the two men, providing the viewer with a thought-provoking scenario that works harder than just the seedy tale of a narcissistic desperado. The screen story makes the implicit case here for ‘nurture’ or ‘environment’ as a main ingredient in the failure of one life versus the success of another.

Here were Versace (Edgar Ramirez, immediately above) and Cunanan (behind him), two gay men with wildly different trajectories, both having had to accommodate before homosexuality gained the degree of equality and acceptance that exists today. Versace was helped through youthful bullying by his dress-maker mother who affirmed his talents, supported, and taught him the value of hard work. As an adult we meet him in a committed relationship, and although HIV positive from the random-sex the partners engaged in with others, Versace was nevertheless imbued with the joy of his own creative process and enormous success. (Below, left, Ricky Martin, playing Antonio D’Amico, shown at right, Versace’s partner for 11 years).

In contrast, Andrew, with a genius IQ, the most promising of his siblings, was adulated and spoiled beyond common sense by his parents; they filled him with outlandish dreams of his own perfection until he became unable to tolerate rejection or failure — he was an exhibitionist and prolific liar by his teens (below, Cunanan, r., Criss, l). In the last year of his life he began to lose it — the world was not adoring him, the man he loved was afraid of him, and others saw through his lies. “Andrew was beaten by things other people overcame” said Smith —“it became a very interesting counterpoint” portrayed on screen with contrasting views of their childhoods.

Born to an unhappily married Filipino father (Jon Jon Briones) and pious Italian-American mother (Joanna Adler), it was Andrew, the youngest of four, awarded the master-bedroom of the family home in San Diego, sent to an exclusive private high school, and indulged with a sports car.

His father, Modesto, was a fabulist, seeing in Andrew the genius he attributed to himself, the child who would bring him glory. He succeeded as a stock-broker until he failed, having robbed clients and avoided arrest by fleeing to Manila, abandoning wife and children and leaving them destitute. Andrew’s disastrous visit to Modesto must have been a turning point in dealing with life-as-it-is. Seeing his father’s degraded circumstance in Manila (below) in contrast to the pretense of success in the states, worsened Andrew’s downward spiral in an already peripatetic life; he grew needier, more manipulative, and directionless. Obsessed with fame, he supported himself as a prostitute/drug dealer in which he courted older gay men who bought him the appearance of wealth he craved, the success Modesto falsely role-modeled.

If there are diagnoses for Modesto or his wife’s mental status in some doctor’s file, they do not figure in this telling; Andrew’s parents are shown having raised a pampered prince, unfit for life’s vagaries. And as he reckoned with the contradiction between his sense of entitlement and the cards life was dealing, he began to murder.

First was his friend, Jeffrey Trail (Finn Wittrock), a former U.S. naval officer, who was in recovery from the difficulties of being a gay officer in the service, the episode offering a deeply embarrassing look at don’t-ask-don’t-tell exigencies in the navy. Andrew’s former lover, architect David Madson, was next (below, Cody Fern). Madson was then achieving success as an architect and rejecting Andrew, but still easily manipulated by him. Madson was free to run but imprisoned in a no-escape Stockholm syndrome.

Then 72-year-old Lee Miglin (Mike Farrell), a Chicago property developer who paid Andrew for sex, was stabbed and throat slit after which Andrew stole his car (below with insert of Miglin). Next to last and most random, he shot a 45-year-old man in New Jersey for his red truck. Andrew then hid in plain sight in Miami for two months, stalking Versace whom he had once met, the most enviable target he had chosen to punish for his own failure; Versace was not just rich and famous but an artist. 

Andrew had eluded arrest thus far because of the relative secrecy of gay life in fly-over country. By the time Jeff Trail and David Madson were found in Minnesota and Miglin in Chicago, Andrew was long gone. Death of the beloved icon in Miami, however, focused the mind of law enforcement and Cunanan was found — dead.

The series begins with Versace’s murder and then unfolds in reverse order until the childhood influences on Versace and Cunanan come into focus as unsurprising ‘aha’s’ near the series conclusion. Criss, a product of Glee and half Filipino like Andrew, has blazed into stardom with this heavy-weight lead role, winning an Emmy and Golden Globe last year. Criss’s Andrew dazzles, charms, and mesmerizes his prey and us, his audience.

A few other actors were memorable: Australian Fern’s deer-in-the headlights affect as Cunanan’s lover-cum-victim, David Madson, stays with you, and Judith Light’s portrayal of Lee Miglin’s wife, for which she received an Emmy nomination. Marilyn Miglin never knew what hit her, that her marriage was not peaches-and-cream, or that her husband hid a secret sex life that would lead to his being bound with tape and stabbed to death. Marilyn was the oblivious, blond-helmeted business-woman who sweet-talked her own line of ‘pheromone’ perfumes on a TV home shopping network. Ms Light created Barbie doll’s perfect grand-mom in a perfect pink suit until Andrew Cunanan fowled the whole picture perfect.

On team Versace, Penélope Cruz does a compassionate, loving Donatella (below, top r). Some Spanish language undertones to the Italian-accented English of the Versace entourage were perceptible — never mind, one still followed with interest the glamorous but day-to-day ordinaries of the family business and relationships. But no hedging the obvious — this was multi-talented Darren Criss’s show, fulfilling every fantasy of success that his character dreamed of. He carries the entire star-filled tragedy like a dazzling quarterback. He is one to watch.

The above post was written by 

 our monthly correspondent, Lee Liberman

Justin Kelly's KING COBRA explores the gay porn industry via some real-life characters

Sometimes it seems like just about every second movie is "based on true events." Yesterday's film certainly was; so is today's, though this one deals with a milieu that's a good deal shadier. KING COBRA tackles the tale of one, Sean Paul Lockhart, aka Brent Corrigan and later Fox Ryder, a just-under-age gay kid who leaves his California home to come east and begin making movies and having sex with his mentor/director, the owner of a successful pornography company called Cobra Video. Ambition, jealousy and murder follow.

Earlier this month we covered Seed Money, a documentary about another, even more successful, gay porn operator and his thriving business, though that film -- much more encompassing of time periods, fashions, tastes and trends -- offered nothing so sleazy and blood-splattered as this. Written and directed by Justin Kelly, shown at left, King Cobra proves interesting, of course (what film dealing with all this would not?). It also proves a little too safe.

For a film to want to give us a look at the hardcore porn industry and then completely avoids any full-frontal shots (not even soft: This is a Hollywood product, after all) seems a bit odd, don't you think? Granted, Mr. Kelly and his starry cast are more interested in probing "character" than mere sex play, and he and his actors indeed do a pretty good job of bringing to life these highly troubled strivers.

The four male leads include Christian Slater (above left), as the head of Cobra; Garrett Clayton (center left, above), as the naive twinkie, Lockhart/Corrigan; and James Franco (above, right), as a would-be wealthy fellow who wants to keep his younger, porn-actor lover (Keegan Allen, center, right, and below) in the accustomed style.

Two high-profile actresses -- Molly Ringwald as the Cobra owner's sister, and Alicia Silverstone, as Lockhart's mom -- complete the major cast, but the women's roles are so cursorily conceived and written that these two characters could have been left out of the film entirely with little damage done. No, this movie belong to the guys, as you might expect in a film that deals so heavily with the gay porn industry.

Because three of the four males we meet here are extremely troubled people (Lockhart seems the least so, but then the movie also seems based more on his version of events than on anything else), we're almost constantly confronted with jealousy, ambition run amok, some very bizarre stabs at love (and then some very bizarre stabs), and of course the hot sex. And while the performers are more than up to these tasks, by the finale, despite the obvious strangeness of it all, it somehow seems like a little too much of the same old/same old.

Think of King Cobra as noir gone gay. Or maybe a treatise on the evils of the pornography business (that ends up showing how "good" porn can be made). Or perhaps just a movie that's simultaneously dark and silly. And, in its peculiar way, offers a certain amount of odd, bleak fun.

From IFC Midnight and running 91 minutes, the film opens this Friday, October 21, in limited theatrical release, while hitting VOD the same day.

André Téchiné's IN THE NAME OF MY DAUGHTER -- glamour, nostalgia, crime, and maybe justice

Of the 22 mostly excellent movies made by French director André Téchiné, at least a half-dozen of these have starred the iconic actress Catherine Deneuve, and his latest, IN THE NAME OF MY DAUGHTER, if not one of his best, is certainly worth seeing and mulling. Taken from a real-life crime tale that is evidently very well-known to the French, the movie will not resonate so strongly here in America, and yet its odd and transfixing story should grab foreign-film audiences nonetheless.

M. Téchiné, shown at right, tells the tale in his usual clear-eyed manner, allowing us to view only what observers to these events might have seen and heard, without unduly pushing us in any positive or negative direction involving the characters. Instead of heroes and villains, we get something much more in-between: people with their own agenda who do things good and bad, kind or crappy, toward goals of which we (maybe sometimes even they) can't always be certain. This lends the movie not merely a particular kind of unhinged suspense but also leads to its satisfying-in-some-ways, not-so-in-others conclusion.

This sort of keeping us off-balance, while giving his characters room to expand, deflate or simply surprise us, has been one of the hallmarks of Téchiné's oeuvre, and it is why some of us so treasure the filmmaker. It has also kept him rather firmly out of the art-film mainstream -- even though his films are often set in particularly beautiful locations. But screw that. Téchiné is better -- richer, smarter and finally more genuinely humane -- than mere mainstream.

Here he brings to pulsating life the mid-1970s-set story of a problemed relationship between a mother (played by Ms Deneuve, two photos above) and her daughter (Adèle Haenel, shown just above), a failing gambling casino (the film takes place on the French Riviera) that the Mafia would dearly love to take over, and the involvement in all this of an up-and-coming young man who intends to get much farther ahead (the ubiquitous Guillaume Canet, below).

Class, entitlement, sexism, and some generally inappropriate behavior from nearly all concerned set the movie on a course toward collision. Why and by whom is part of its somewhat nasty charm and sadness. All could have worked out so differently, of course, if behavior from even one of these participants had been a bit different. Which is part of the Téchiné experience, and why some of us we keep coming back to him for more.

The threesome of lead actors does a superb job of keeping us off-balance, with Deneuve giving one of her fiercest performances in some time: such strength put to poor and ill-considered employ. Ms Haenel, whose beauty can stop traffic, is more correctly subdued here: angry but tentative, alternately hopeful and depressed. M. Canet uses his feral side quite well; we may not like him but we certainly understand his motives and actions.

The look of the film is on target, too, as the 70s come back in a rush of color and rather poor (but fun) taste. Everyone smokes, of course, and very large cars -- even for Europe -- are a must.

For the French, this is a story that simply would not die. Many of the movie's most telling moments arrive in more modern-day dress, as some of our characters -- aged quite well by the make-up artists -- live to feint and parry once again.

In the Name of My Daughter -- distributed in the USA by Cohen Media Group and running 116 minutes -- opens tomorrow, Friday, May 15, in New York City at the IFC Center and the Lincoln Plaza Cinema, and in Los Angeles at Laemmle's Royal. In the weeks following, it will open in another 18 cities. To see them all, with theaters and playdates included, click here. 

Island life? Yikes! Dayna Goldfine/Daniel Geller's THE GALAPAGOS AFFAIR: SATAN CAME TO EDEN

When many of us think about The Galapagos Islands (off the coast of Ecuador), the first thing that may come to mind is the seamy/ sleazy use of those islands in the Tennessee Williams play (and movie based on that play), Suddenly Last Summer. We think of those famous turtles, and then perhaps of Williams' character of Sebastian, much talked of but never actually seen, and his gaudy demise. One of those Galapagos turtles is viewed to enormous effect in the new documentary THE GALAPAGOS AFFAIR: SATAN CAME TO EDEN, and its huge size and large, expressive face are among the strangest and most beautiful things in this very strange film. Local lore has it that these turtles can size up a newcomer to the island immediately, knowing if s/he is bound for a good or a bad end.

By the time you've seen that turtle's face again and come to the conclusion of this eye-opening, mind-expanding, two-hour documentary -- written, produced and directed by the team of Dayna Goldfine and Daniel Geller (shown above, flanking actor Thomas Kretschmann, who voiced one of the characters here), you can only imagine what the old, heavy-shelled fellow determined about the folk you've just met -- most of whom are German and several of whom have come to very bad ends. (You may also, if you're anything like me, be wondering what it was about post-WWI/pre-WWII Germany that made for such delicious, often nasty decadence and stupidity. Christopher Isherwood was certainly onto something in his Berlin Stories!)

We know from the start that bad things happened -- but to whom, how and why become the mystery of the film. The filmmakers, however, are interested in much more than mere mystery. The Galapagos Affair tackles the very idea of '"island paradises" and probes the kind of character traits and human beings who would elect to struggle so far afield from the way most of humanity lives. The original German emigres to the Galapagos were Dore Strauch and Friedrich Ritter (shown above, with Ritter on the right), lovers who had left their respective mates to come and live as "pioneers," even though Strauch had been recently diagnosed with Multiple schlerosis. Almost immediately these two are in trouble.

Joining this odd pair on Floreana (one of the smaller islands), though uninvited, comes the family Wittmer -- father, pregnant mother and their son (shown above soon after their daughter was born on the island) -- expecting evidently (because they, too, are German) to be welcomed with open arms.

And then comes the pièce de résistance, a would-be "Baroness" (above, right) and her two lovers, with big plans to build a hotel resort on the island, who arrive and immediately, by sheer force of "entitlement," try to take over the island.

As word of these strange people reaches civilization, newspaper and magazine articles (above and below) appear, ships occasionally dock and scientists and others arrive to see how the oddities are faring. Jealousies and tensions mount, a severe drought occurs and finally...  well, you really had to be there.

Thanks to Ms Goldfine and Mr. Geller, who earlier gave us the terrific documentary Ballet Russes, we are there. The filmmakers have elected to tell their story the old-fashioned way -- no "dramatic re-enactments" here -- using some wonderful archival footage, along with the many letters and other writings of several of the participants (given voice by some very high-end actors: Cate Blanchett, Diane Kruger, Sebastian Koch, Connie Nielsen, Gustaf Skarsgård, Josh Radnor and Herr Kretschmann).

There are also interviews with a host of talking heads (I counted 16 such) who are descendants of the original characters or have simply lived in the Galapagos for decades. People like Carmen Kubler Angermeyer (right) and Jose Machuca (below) provide lots of information and ideas about not only what happened to this bizarre crew but why certain folk choose

this kind of lifestyle. Together with the archival footage and information, and the many interviews with Galapagos residents, we begin to build up a real knowledge of what island life must be like. Finally, when a woman named Friedel Horneman (below) tells us of her early life, arranged marriage and her means of

escaping same, although none of this figures into the main story thread, it suddenly stands on its own as a kind of perfect example of "Galapagosiana" and how island life can make one do the oddest things. Along the way, we're also treated to actual footage from a "pirate movie" filmed by, I believe, one of those ship's captains, and starring the Baroness (overacting to beat the band) and her motley crew.

By the finale, the movie has turned into a Rashomon-like experience calling for the old Pontius Pilate question, What is truth? Considering all the little liars on view here, my final response was a huge sigh and the thought that "Wow-- this absolutely could not have happened to a nicer bunch of people!" As one of the talking heads tells us at the close, "Paradise is not a place. It's a philosophy." If so, it's one that is nowhere to be found in the lives of these 1930s nitwits.

The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden, from Zeitgeist Films, opens this Friday, April 4, in New York City at the Lincoln Plaza Cinema, on April 11 in San Francisco at the Embarcadero Center Cinema, and in Los Angeles at Laemmle's Royal on April 18.

After (and sometimes during) these weeks, the film will slowly expand across the country. To see all currently scheduled playdates, with cities and theaters, simply click here and then use the sidebar at right to scroll down....

The graphics above are from the film 

itself, except for the photo of the filmmakers, 

which is by Jason Kempin and comes 

courtesy of Getty Images.

Q&A with Marco Amenta, writer/director of THE SICILIAN GIRL: on life before & after; growth, change and a slower pace; & how a dose of reality -- rather than glamour -- might change our view of the Mafia

We first met Marco Amenta in June of 2009 at a luncheon for the press and trade during the FSLC’s 2009 Open Roads festival of new Italian films. Amenta is the writer/director of The Sicilian Girl, which just opened its premier theatrical run at Film Forum in New York City, and will soon be seen all across the USA, thanks to Music Box Films. We cornered the filmmaker for a chat at that luncheon, and followed up on it 14 months later with another conversation -- which occurred at Film Forum this past Thursday -- now that his film has been released. (The filmmaker is shown above, right, with his leading lady,
Veronica D'Agostino.)

In the following transcript, TrustMovies’ questions appear in boldface, while Amenta's answers are in standard type. (You can find my earlier write-ups on the film, in order of posting, here, here and here.)

So, Marco: You're actually from Sicily?

Yes. I grew up in Palermo until I was 18 or 19, and then I moved to France. And I started to work as photo-journalist in Paris for Gamma press agency and several magazines (Paris Match, L'Express, Liberation, etc.). I covered the war in Yugoslavia, Cuba, and also the Mafia, taking pictures of the Mafiosi and the killings and the judges. And then I followed this with making documentaries about the Mafia. (Note: You can view the  younger Marco two photos below.) And I think that this is important because I saw directly what the Mafia is. I saw in front of me the eyes of Mafia guys who, in some ways, without using even words, they threaten you. I saw the real dead bodies on the streets of Palermo and I saw also the courage in the eyes of policemen and judges who fight against the Mafia. From all this direct experience I got inspiration for this movie. And that us why I think I am telling a story that is more real than many Mafia stories we have seen in international movies.

Or even in the movie we just saw in Open Roads, Brave Men. I don’t mean to put that movie down, as there are some good things about it, but your film is so immediate and dramatic: much more real somehow.

Sometimes directors… I'm not talking in this specific case, get inspiration from other movies, instead of getting it from life. Then you lose contact with real life and you portray something fake. Tarantino does it, but he does it on purpose -- for fun and for effect. He is a master at that.

Yes, and that can also be very entertaining. But your film goes way beyond this sort of thing.

If you want to tell a realistic story that comes from the place of neo-realism, then you have to get inspiration from real life. And I met these people so I know that it is useless to represent them as “heroes” or as some kind of romantic people.

Did you see the film A Hundred Steps?

Yes, of course

That one also seemed more real to me.

It is. For my film, I used professional actors, but I also used lots of actors who are not really professional. They come from difficult areas in Palermo. For instance, the boy who plays the boyfriend of Rita is a guy who grew up in a very difficult place. So he knows.

That particular role was such as tricky one. I mean, in real life and in your movie: to be so back-and-forth like he was, between the girl and the mob. And you really do feel that he does care for her....

Yes, definitely.

That last scene: at first I thought, oh, he is there to kill her. But then no, I don’t think he was.

He is trapped.

Yes, everybody is trapped in your film.

In real life, he has grown up in an area surrounded by people in crime, so he had to make a choice. Always, he is pulling back. And this young man, by being an actor, as well, is trying to do a different life. Because his friends from his youth, they ask him to come back to that same kind of thing. So I used these kind of guys because they know.

And he is now a professional actor?

Well, he has done two or three roles, but he never trained as an actor.

How did you find your “girl”? I believe she has only made Respiro and one TV movie previously.

She comes from Lampedusa, an island south of Sicily. And she feels very right. She never trained as an actress. And I like this. She is still naïve and like a little wild animal. I like to play with this wild feeling and this tenderness, as well. She is more calm in real life, but when I met her and chose the actors, I saw that she had this life inside her, and when you play with non-professional actors, the director has to be even more skilled in… not manipulating, but using different sides of an actor.

It’s OK: you can manipulate. Directors manipulate.

When you ask professional actors -- for sadness, for rage, for comedy, they can give it to you. But non-professional actors, you have to find a way for them to express this because they do not always realize how they can do this. But they have this true-ness and this real quality, and so I let them play in their own dialect, rather than in Italian. In the film, the first part of the movie is actually, even in Italy, subtitled – because most Italians will not understand this dialect.

Oh – we don’t see that, I guess, because it’s already subtitled for us.

Yes, in English. But for me it was important for them to talk in their own dialect. I also used non-professional actors that I found in the street, in the countryside, in a lot of small roles. Another example, the killer -- that tall guy -- he was actually in prison for ten years. These people are trying to escape from this life of crime. So this becomes therapy for them in a way.

Did you also see the movie The Sweet and the Bitter? That, for me, also seems to have a more real sense about it.

Yes, and it also used non-professional actors in some roles, people who come from that area. The lead actor Luigi LoCascio does not come from there. He is just a good actor.

He seems to like to stretch himself. One time he will do The Best of Youth, where he is this wonderful character, and then he will turn around and do Bellocchio’s Good Morning Night, where he plays a terrorist.

In life, LoCascio is more an intellectual than a wild character, I think. In my film, the boy who plays the boyfriend, he reminds me of the young Robert DeNiro. He has that wildness that you cannot control.

How did you come to cast Gérard Jugnot (shown below) in your film?

I lived for ten years in France, and after doing the photo-journalism, I worked as a documentary filmmaker in France, so I have a relationship with France. And The Sicilian Girl was a real co-production, where 30% of the budget came from France.

So you probably had to use a French actor in one of the main roles?

Yes, I had to use a French actor, but that is not the only reason.

Well, you made such a good choice. And one that I would not have expected, as I just saw Jugnot in Paris 36, in such a different role.

For me, I do not want some Italian actor who was very famous to play Judge Borsellino. I did not want to use an Italian actor who would “cover” the character. We would have seen this famous judge with a face that was famous because of someone else – the actor. So it would be strange to see this. But Gérard is someone not known in Italy. And so you can think he is a judge.

Yes, and he has real gravitas!

Yes – and humanity, as well! He is like a father. And I needed somebody who was like a father here. People in Italy ask me, “Who is this Sicilian actor who plays the judge?!” So people believe. And this works. In the past we have seen a cowboy like Burt Lancaster play an aristocratic Sicilian in The Leopard by Visconti and Robert de Niro play a rich countryman in 1900 by Bertolucci.

Jugnot was dubbed, of course?

Yes, he was dubbed. But very good actors will play with their eyes, and with emotions. They actually talk to each other -- the girl and the judge -- without understanding each other!

Really?

Yes, because she does not speak French, nor he Italian. In movies, like in life, language is not always the main thing. Instead it is the subtext. Like the eyes the body, also in life. They are the subtext – the body language. If you want to seduce a woman, or to tell her that you like her, you don’t have to use words. You talk about the weather or something else, but with your eyes, you say those things.

Did you stick fairly close to the real story in your film?

Yes. I did a documentary film on the same story a few years ago. So I did a lot of research. I got a lot of sense of these characters: the girl, the policemen, the judges. I even met the mother. Then I did elaborate on the story, and so I changed some names, and made other changes to tell a more universal story. But the main story, it is all there. And all of it is true.

That mother was really something. Whew! Do you think she was jealous of the daughter’s relationship with her father, the mother’s husband?

I think that her whole life was a failure, and she knows this. Because she did not stand up. And so she knows her daughter is right, but this means that her whole life is wrong. So you cannot accept that your whole life is wrong. There is envy, there is hatred, anger and love. Envy, because the daughter had to courage to do what the mother could not.

Also, the girl has to comes to terms with the reality of her father – as in that scene (above) in court with the gun -- where you actually get the “remembering” in very well. It was subtle enough, too, and it worked.

I worked with a screenwriter who worked with Sergio Leone. I co-wrote with him: Sergio Donati.

Wow—he must pretty old by now.

Not so old. Maybe 70.

I’m almost 70; I’d call that old.

With Sergio I wrote my next movie also: Banker to the Poor.

Around this point, we had to stop our 
original conversation with Signor Amenta

Now, here we are, some fourteen months later, 
and The Sicilian Girl has been picked up 
for distribution by Music Box Films.

Marco—I am so happy that your film has finally been picked up. After I first saw it during last years FSLC Italian festival Open Roads, I noticed that the Film Society brought it back again at the end of the year for its Encores program of the most popular films shown during the preceding year. And when I went to see it again, I noticed that the Music Box logo preceded the movie, and so I figured that this distributor has picked it up. But that was eight months ago, and only now is the movie being released. But I am just glad we’re finally getting to see it!

Actually, you know, Music Box could have released the film before also, but because Film Forum wanted the film, they held back the release because Music Box wanted it to premiere here at Film Forum. That was their choice.

A good choice!

Yes. In the rest of the country, the release will be through Landmark Theaters. On September 10, it is opening in L.A., Chicago and then in the SanFrancisco area. And then further to Washington, Seattle, San Diego (October 1). And all through Landmark, all over the country.  (Note: You can find the entire listing here: click the link and scroll down.)

This makes me feel very good. To see this film in so many theaters. It’s like… finding out I have good taste, after all!

(He laughs) Yes. You were one of the first here to review it in a good way.

And I’ve mentioned it once or twice since then, hoping that somebody would notice. Now, when we met earlier you were working on Banker to the Poor. And I think you had just started that when I first met you. So what has happened with that film and script since then? Have you started filming yet?

Oh, no.   No, no, no, no. We are still working the script. And still financing the film. We did a rewrite now, with one of the writers of Gomorrah, Massimo Gaudioso. He is great with dialog and a very good writer who has won an award for that film, the European Film Awards -- like the Oscars for Europe. And we won this screenwriting prize at last year’s Tribeca Film Festival.

For The Sicilan Girl?

No—for Banker to the Poor.

I didn’t even realize that Tribeca had a screenplay prize.

Yes, it is with The Sloan Foundation. It is for helping to support projects having to do with scientific things, innovation, people trying to do good things in the world.

Was this before after I met you? It must have been after we met.

(Marco thinks a moment) No, it was before, but maybe we talked mostly about The Sicilian Girl.

And this prize allowed you to start working with the Gomorrah writer?

Yes.

So, tell me how your life has changed over the last year since I first met you.

(He thinks a moment) Wow…

Or has it? Maybe it hasn’t changed. I don’t know.

(Long pause, as Marco really takes time to think). Well, I now have a niece. My sister, a producer, has had a little girl.

Is this your first young addition to the family?

Yes.

Are you married? I don’t think I even asked you about this before…

No. But this niece makes me think about it.

Yes, life is going on, Marco, and you need another person....

Actually, I am more concentrating on the creative side. I would like to concentrate more and more artistically on the film. I am trying to appreciate more the creative work now. And I want to work with a writer on another film about Africa, a thriller, an adventure film about the environment and Africa.

And Banker to the Poor? Is this maybe about that banker in Italy who was found hanging under the bridge?

Oh, no, no no! It is about Muhammad Yunus, the guy who won the Nobel Prize in 2006, and who invented the Microloan.

Oh, yes, my cousin in Holland is involved very heavily in that and got me to invest a little chunk of money in a Microloan project. I feel that this is wonderful thing.

Yes, it is because he invented this way of lending just a little heart of money to poor people, breaking the rule of banks -- that normally don’t lend money to poor people who don’t have guarantees. That is why he was such a genius: because he said, Why don’t we try? We can break this rule. And the banks, you know, they don’t follow him in the beginning. But he keeps on with this idea, and in the end, he proved that it works. And actually, his banks have a higher restitution rate -- the rates of the people who pay their loans back -- than do the other banks: the “normal” banks used by the rich people.

Yes, I have read that! That’s a wonderful record.

That is why the banks, in the world financial crisis last year, they went too far from their real jobs, the reason  why they were first created. So these microloans are now giving the idea of a new way to help the people in the under-developed world. And even in western society. The normal way of giving big money with big organization to the third world actually did not help a lot. It was spread around and went to corruption. So this is again a story of people who get off the beaten track and go to invent a different direction – sort of as did my Sicilian girl, Rita.

But with a happier outcome!

(He laughs) Finally I have a film with a happy ending. All my films are tragic. But now I will make a happy ending! Also, over the past year since I saw you, I have been going all around the world, presenting my film. In Holland, in France, in Italy, of course. And in New Zealand, and now in America.

I think your film had already opened in Italy when I met you.

Yes. I got a nomination for the Italian Oscar, the Donatello Award.

 That’s right. Who won that year?

Mid-August Lunch. A very funny movie.

Oh, yes! That’s a sweet little movie. It also played here at Film Forum.

Yes. It won Best First Feature.

And that is what you were nominated for, Best First Feature?

Yes. But I also won the Gold Ticket Award: for the film most seen in the schools of Italy.

They showed The Sicilian Girl in the schools?

Yes, they show a lot of films in the schools And mine was the most seen.

Boy—they would never show a film like that in the schools here. Which is too bad. They should!

I went to a lot of schools. And this shows that teenagers… well, we usually say that oh, this new generation of teenagers, they only want to see movies about vampires, or stupid comedies. It’s not true. Because when we show a movie like this, they like it, and you know something? When the schools bring their kids for a day of cinema, it is usually like, Oh, the kids just want to lose a day of school.

Yes, right. They get to miss school, so they love that.

Yes, they don’t care about the movie. They just want to flirt with their girlfriend, or their boyfriend, they fool around whatever. But I went a few times to see how they react, and at the screening, yes, in the beginning, they start out with the noise and the fooling around but then they start to watch and to listen and they are caught up. And then they shut up. They love the film. They get shocked. They cry. They ask questions. It shows that they are not just silly, like we think or want to pretend. The problem is that a film like this does not get a big distribution. So the kids don’t hear of it.

No, they hear about Eclipse or New Moon or …

Or films they can choose. On TV, they are bombed by the ads, and that is all they know. So they go to see those films. A small independent film like this, they like very much and they write comments on Facebook about it. This is proof that these kids are not some lost generation.

When do you think you will begin shooting Banker to the Poor?

Next year.

So it will be ready to show in maybe 2012?

Yes. Actually, this year I came a lot to the States to work on the new film. Because I had a lot of interest in this film. I got a manager in L.A. – Christopher Barrett, at Metropolitan Agency. Also I met Peter Fonda, who has now helped and introduced me to producers and other people. He liked very much The Sicilian Girl when it screener in L.A.. Maybe it made a reminder for him a little bit: his days of Easy Rider, and the rebellion time. But we like each other. He is a guy who is off-track and has Beat Generation ideas. And I am like that, too. So he introduced me to producer who might be interested in Banker to the Poor. Also, now I find that my pace is starting to change.

Are you going faster?

No, slower. Focusing on less things, but focusing on them more deeply.

Good: That’s healthy.

Yes, being aware of time passing. Thinking more to have a family…

Ah, so you have a girlfriend now?

Ummm… (He smiles) Yes! The usual story, but…

Next time. In another year, maybe we’ll talk about that!

Yes. Before, this sort of thing was not my world. I wanted just to create. But now…

How old are you now?

40.

Ah. This is the time that your roots start grabbing hold of the ground and you want to settle in.

Definitely. At my age my father already had two children.  Now, maybe we have lost the idea of family? In Italy, principally -- I don’t know about here in the States -- but people are afraid.

That’s all over the western world, I think. Particularly now. Is the world even going to last -- what with global warming and all its effects? And the Banks and Wall Street doing their stupid things. And the economy. It’s bad all over. I can understand young people feeling “iffy,” as we say.

Well, here in the U.S. I am creating a basis to work in the states.

To work in movies? Or TV?

In Movies! Meeting producers, making bases here. I have met some interested producers. There are some people interested in a remake of The Sicilian Girl.

A remake? Setting it here in America?

Yes.

Hmmm… America’s idea of the Mafia and Italy’s idea of the mafia are like this and that. (I move my arms as far away from each other as possible.) I can’t imagine an American remake, but still, it’s good for you as a career thing. Anyway, the movie has opened here, and you’ve received some very good reviews – Stanley Kaufman’s in The New Republic is wonderful! So next time, I’ll look forward to seeing and talking with you again -- about your new film!

(All photos above are either from the film The Sicilian Girl, or cribbed from Google's Images for Marco Amenta site. Only one is identified (thank you, Abaca!), but if any photographer would like proper credit, just let me know your name and the image, and I will be happy to do that.)