VENICE, Italy – A group of 25 Italian directors said on Sunday they planned to release in October a controversial film about violent clashes that scarred a summit in Genoa six weeks ago, leaving one protester dead.
VENICE, Italy – A group of 25 Italian directors said on Sunday they planned to release in October a controversial film about violent clashes that scarred a summit in Genoa six weeks ago, leaving one protester dead.
The film, still being edited and as yet unnamed, will show the build-up to the meeting, as heads of state from the Group of Eight leading industrial nations gathered in the city, and more than a quarter of a million people prepared to take to the streets to protest against them.
"This film will not just be about the violence, but about the whole nature of the anti-globalization movement in the build-up to the Genoa summit, and the experience of these people during the week they were in the city," Francesca Comincini, one of the directors, told a news conference at the Venice Film Festival.
Three days of violent clashes between police and demonstrators saw one protester, 23-year-old Carlo Giuliani, shot dead by a policeman. More than 300 people were arrested, while the city was left looking like a war zone of smashed-up buildings and burned-out cars.
The directors, who worked closely with Vittorio Agnoletto, the head of the Genoa Social Forum protest organization, while shooting more than 260 hours of footage, said their film would reveal the deep-seated passion that the demonstrators brought to their cause. It would also show the tough police response.
"They have filmed and will reveal the truth," said Agnoletto, a lawyer turned protester who is now the spokesman for an organization representing around 700 other protest groups.
The film, which will be released in two versions, a 60-minute documentary for television and a 120-minute feature for cinema, is likely to attract heated controversy.
Senior police officials have already come under fire, and some have lost their jobs, for the way in which the security operation was carried out. The head of the police has admitted to parliament that some officers used excessive force.
Several of the directors, speaking to a packed audience which included dozens of veterans of Genoa, said they had been shocked by the brutality of the events at Genoa and had footage which showed Italy’s military police making unprovoked attacks on peaceful protesters.
Police have already seized footage shot by news agencies of the violence, including photographs of the moments leading up to the shooting of Giuliani. The police officer who shot Giuliani, who said he feared for his own life as the protester prepared to throw a fire extinguisher at him, could face murder charges.
Comincini, one of Italy’s leading young female filmmakers, said making the piece had left her with no doubt where she stood in the debate between anti-globalization protesters and the power of G8 nations.
"It’s up to us to decide what side we are on, and I want to say that I am clearly on the side of that man (Giuliani)," she said.
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News Service: Reuters
URL: http://www.reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=entertainmentnews&StoryID=194172
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