The Cineteca di Bologna at Cannes Classic
As every year, the Festival de Cannes invites the audience to explore again the history of Cinema presenting a selection of the best restored prints.
The Cineteca di Bologna and its L'Immagine Ritrovata laboratory present three titles: Francesco Giullare di Dio (The Flowers of St. Francis) by Roberto Rossellini; Murder in Harlem by Oscar Micheaux, the first African-American director in the history of cinema; Lumumba, la mort du prophète by Raoul Peck, a project made within the collaboration with Martin Scorsese’s World Cinema Project.
The Cineteca di Bologna has already curated the restoration of other films by Roberto Rossellini. Francesco Giullare di Dio – nowadays considered one of Rossellini's most unique films – was not well-received by the audience, while the critics “waxed lyrical”. Cannes Classics presents it as part of the celebration of the 70 years of the Cahiers du Cinéma: Rossellini was one of magazine co-founder André Bazin's favourite directors and this film was covered in the magazine's very first issue in 1951.
Murder in Harlem by Oscar Micheaux is a tribute to the true pioneer of the African-American film industry. The most successful African-American director of the first half of the 20th century (he wrote, directed and produced more than 44 films), was forgotten by the time of his death in 1951, and his notoriety reappeared only at the end of the 1980s. The tribute to Micheaux includes the screening of Oscar Micheaux – The Superhero of Black Filmmaking, a documentary by Francesco Zippel that reconstructs his extraordinary achievements and examines his contemporary legacy.
The restoration of Lumumba, la mort du prophète by Raoul Peck is part of the African Film Heritage Project, an initiative created by The Film Foundation’s World Cinema Project, the Pan African Federation of Filmmakers and UNESCO – in collaboration with Cineteca di Bologna – to help locate, restore, and disseminate African cinema. It was restored in 4K under the supervision of the director, from the original 16mm negatives.
The films presented by the Cineteca di Bologna in Cannes will premiere in Italy at the festival "Il Cinema Ritrovato", in Bologna (July 20-27).