PRESS RELEASE April 20, 2017

Like every year, there will be many Italian and foreign cinema professionals attending Bif&st, the festival in Bari from April 22 to 29, chaired by Margarethe von Trotta and directed by Felice Laudadio.
Among actresses and actors:
Francesco Acquaroli (Alberto Sordi Award), Valeria Bruni Tedeschi (Anna Magnani Award), Claudia Cardinale, Renato Carpentieri, Andrea Carpenzano, Chiara Caselli (jury president of International Panorama competition), Antonio Catania, Fortunato Cerlino, Giorgio Colangeli, Sabrina Ferilli (Federico Fellini Award), Stefano Fresi, Alessandro Gassmann (Cinema Lessons), Paola Gassman, Elio Germano, Corrado Giannelli, Giancarlo Giannini, Leopoldo Mastelloni, Giovanna Mezzogiorno, Maurizio Micheli, Andrea Occhipinti, Micaela Ramazzotti, Primo Reggiani, Michele Riondino, Barbara Ronchi (Alida Valli Award), Paolo Rossi, Ninì Salerno, Greta Scacchi (Cinema Lessons), Riccardo Scamarcio (Vittorio Gassman Award), Federico Tolardo, Pamela Villoresi, Nicolas Vaporidis, Vittorio Viviani.

Among film directors:

Gianni Amelio, Francesca Archibugi (Luciano Vincenzoni Award), Fanny Ardant and Dario Argento and Pupi Avati (Cinema Lessons and Federico Fellini Award), Alessandro Aronadio, Davide Barletti, Francesco Bruni, Maccio Capatonda, Fabrizio Cattani, Lorenzo Conte, Toni D’Angelo, Edoardo De Angelis, Andrea De Sica, Irene Dionisio, Alan Gilsenan, Claudio Giovannesi (Mario Monicelli Award), Francesco Giuffré (Theatre workshop), Ugo Gregoretti, Fariborz Kamkari, Andrej Konchalovskij (Cinema Lessons and Federico Fellini Award), Daniele Maggioni, Fabio Mollo, Giuliano Montaldo, Goran Paskaljevic, Jacques Perrin (Cinema Lessons and Federico Fellini Award), Louis-Julien Petit, Pif (Pierfrancesco Diliberto), Antonio Pisu, Nicola Ragone, Claudio Risi, Giancarlo Scarchilli, Volker Schlöndorff (Cinema Lessons and Federico Fellini Award), Alexandre Valenti, Carlo Vanzina, Mimmo Verdesca, Daniele Vicari.

And also: press agent Enrico Lucherini (Special Events); musicians Enzo Avitabile (Ennio Morricone Award), Andrea Guerra, Lele Marchitelli, Pivio, Giuliano Taviani; producers Claudio Bonivento, Ivan Brienza, Adriana Chiesa, Roberto Cicutto, Tilde Corsi, Massimo Cristaldi, Gianluca Curti, Attilio De Razza and Pier Paolo Verga (Franco Cristaldi Award), Elda Ferri, Elisabetta Olmi, Domenico Procacci, Massimo Spano; costume designer Massimo Cantini Parrini (Piero Tosi Award), art director Marco Dentici (Dante Ferretti Award); screenwriters Nicola Guaglianone, Valentino Picone and Fabrizio Testini (Tonino Guerra Award), Antonio Manca, Silvia Scola, Enrico Vanzina; cinematographers Rocco Marra (Giuseppe Rotunno Award) and Luciano Tovoli; editors Roberto Perpignani and Marco Spoletini (Roberto Perpignani Award); theatre critics Rita Cirio and Maurizio Giammusso; essayists and scholars Alberto Anile, Ennio Bispuri, Franco Cassano, Paolo D’Agostini, Caterina D’Amico, Steve Della Casa, Fabrizio Deriu, Piero Di Siena, Paolo Mereghetti, Giuseppe Vacca.

Among the special programs of Bif&st there is great expectation for “Cinema and Science” with the presence of renowned scientists such as Enrico Alleva, Roberto Argano, Fulvio Fraticelli, Domenico Pignone, Antonio Navarra; and also Franco Marozzi, Giuseppe De Mola of Médecins Sans Frontières and prof. Cristina Cattaneo, the anatomist-pathologist who is engaged since many years in the identification of migrants drowned in the Mediterranean Sea. All of these scientists will give a talk after the daily screening of a film, with free admission, in the Multicinema Galleria at 4 p.m.

The Barion Club will be the new venue (since the traditional Teatro Margherita is under renovation) for the press conferences at 1 p.m., for the afternoon meetings at 5 p.m. on Vittorio Gassman, Dino Risi and Totò hosted by the great French film critic Jean Gili, and for the Focus at 7 p.m. hosted by Franco Montini, president of the National union of film critics, with the participation of the award winners.

Most of the festival events are free. For the Multicinema Galleria free screenings a ticket must be collected thirty minutes in advance at the cinema cashier, on a first-come, first-served basis.

“I would like to point out – added Laudadio – an exceptional aspect of the communication related to Bif&st. No other Italian festival, from the most important one, the Venice festival, to other medium ones such as Rome and Turin, has the privilege of three dedicated inserts or specials, indipendently made by important dailies as Corriere del Mezzogiorno, La Repubblica and, starting this year,  La Gazzetta del Mezzogiorno. These inserts confirm again – definitively, I would say – the deep rooting in Apulia achieved by the festival in very few years. This is the reason why important institutions and companies such as Confidustria and ANCE Bari and BAT,  Gruppo Menelao, Gruppo Marino Automobili have tangibly invested on this young film festival promoted by Apulia Region and produced by Apulia Film Commission.”