L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 27, 2018 www.italoamericano.org 22 L'Italo-Americano SEATTLE ITALIAN COMMUNITY R ank heis ts , police chas es , beautiful actress, cruel gang- sters, crooked cops and social criticism: M arco P onti's new es t film, Reckless Life (Una Vita Speri- colata), has a little bit of every- thing in it. The film is a combination of madcap comedy, pulp fiction and spaghetti western. It follows two friends in their late 20s, Rossi and BB, who are strug- gling to make a decent living in Italy's present-day economy. When his loan application is denied, Rossi robs a bank "by mistake," setting off a chain of events that involves his friend BB and a washed-up soap-opera a c t r e s s c a l l e d S o l e d a d . T h e threesome set out on a daring escapade that takes them the entire length of Italy, north to south, where high-speed car chases, severed body parts and shootouts are the norm. Director Marco Ponti is best known for his 2001 debut film Santa Maradona, which also centered on police chases, acro- batic stunts and a life of reckless a b a n d o n . T h e f i l m w o n t w o D a v i d d i D o n a t e l l o A w a r d s (best new director and best sup- p o r t i n g a c t o r ) a n d g a r n e r e d international recognition. Ponti was born in 1967 in the Piedmont region of Italy. He graduated from the University of Turin and started his career as a copywriter. A scriptwriting course, followed by a course for movie writers offered by RAI Cinema Fiction School, changed t h e d i r e c t i o n o f h i s c a r e e r . B e s i d e s f i l m , h e h a s a l s o worked in theater, TV and live broadcasting, and has directed music videos, documentaries a n d c o m m e r c i a l s . F o r t h r e e years, he was a regular guest on the radio show Colazione da Tiffany. Recently, Seattle Audiences gave a warm welcome to Ponti's latest film, Reckless Life,which was screened at the 10 th annual Cinema Italian Style film festi- v a l , p r e s e n t e d b y S I F F . W e caught up with director Ponti after the film. How would you describe Reckless Life? It's part action movie, part comedy and part twisted-love story. It's also a fairy tale with a rock-and-roll type of energy. It covers a lot of issues that are so important in Italy right now: jobs, politics, dreams, love. The film is my way of talking about these things and bringing them to the attention of a wider audi- ence. Why did you choose this k i n d o f o v e r - t h e - t o p r o a d movie? Before shooting Reckless Life, I had filmed back-to-back romantic movies. They were big-budget films with famous actors and they were quite suc- cessful. With this film, I wanted to put everything into it that I was interested in, everything that I like, so there are car chas- es, a love triangle, gangsters. E a c h o f t h e c h a r a c t e r s f a i l s somehow. The two main charac- ters, Rossi and BB, are heroes but not heroes. The actress is washed up. Everyone is at a low point in their lives in one way or another. The crisis they face gives them the opportunity to do something with their lives. What challenges did you face making this movie? The budget for this film is lower than usual, and we shot in l o t s o f l o c a t i o n s . W e h a d t o make sure everything was ready to go because we did not have back-ups. We only had one car that we could crash, so we had to make sure we did it precisely. We only had six liters of fake blood, so we had it use it wisely. Everything was in the moment. We had a lot of fun shooting especially in the south of Italy, b u t w e w o r k e d d u r i n g a n e x t r e m e l y h o t s u m m e r . T h e soles of my Nike sneakers actu- ally exploded because the pave- ment was so hot, and some of our crew and cast fainted. But we all managed to survive. One unusual thing that hap- pened was that we saw a small airplane crash nearby where we were shooting. We were right there, and we helped extinguish the flames and rescue the pas- sengers. It was an amazing expe- rience, and after it was all over, we were very matter-of-fact and said: Okay, let's get back to work and finish the movie! It's the first time anything like that had ever happened to me. H o w d i d y o u c h o o s e t h e shooting locations? We started the film in the very north of Italy, where it bor- ders France. A lot of immigrants come into Italy from this area. A n d w e e n d e d t h e f i l m i n Puglia, where a lot of immi- grants are arriving from Africa. I wanted the film to span these n a t i o n a l b o r d e r s t h a t h a v e become so contentious in our country. H o w ' s t h e f i l m d o i n g i n Italy? Unfortunately, Italians don't w a n t t o s e e I t a l i a n m o v i e s . About 99.9 percent of movies watched in Italy are made in America. There is no money in Italian movies. One problem is that there are very few theater screens available compared to the number of films released. If a film doesn't do well in one week, it closes. There is no time to grow the audience. It either works, or it doesn't. A n y f i n a l t h o u g h t s o n Italy's film industry? It's tragic that the Italian film market is so small. I believe that in the future, more Italian films will be shot in English for a for- eign market. I think as an indus- t r y w e h a v e t o m a k e b e t t e r movies that can be distributed internationally or the film indus- try in Italy is headed for col- lapse. RITA CIPALLA "Reckless Life" by Marco Ponti is a madcap road movie that includes high-speed car chases, violent gangsters and a steamy love triangle. (RAI Cinema) Marco Ponti's newest comedy calls attention to Italy's economic woes Director Marco Ponti, best known for his 2001 award-winning film, "Santa Mara- dona."

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