Francesco Rosi

Francesco Rosi (; 15 November 1922 – 10 January 2015) was an Italian film director and screenwriter. His film The Mattei Affair won the Palme d'Or at the 1972 Cannes Film Festival. Rosi's films, especially those of the 1960s and 1970s, often appeared to have political messages, while the topics of his later films became less politically oriented and more angled toward literature. He made his debut with his first self-directed film in 1958 and continued to direct until 1997, his last film being the adaptation of Primo Levi's book, The Truce.

In 2008, 13 of his films were screened at the Berlin International Film Festival. He received the Honorary Golden Bear for Lifetime Achievement, accompanied by the screening of his 1962 film Salvatore Giuliano. In 2012 the Venice Biennale awarded Rosi the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement.

Biography

Origins and early career Rosi was born in Naples in 1922. His father worked in the shipping industry, but was also a cartoonist and had, at one time, been reprimanded for his satirical drawings of Benito Mussolini and King Vittorio Emmanuel III. At the same time he began working as a reporter for . There he became friendly with Raffaele La Capria, Aldo Giuffrè and Giuseppe Patroni Griffi, with each of whom he would later often collaborate.

His show business career began in 1946 as an assistant to Ettore Giannini for the stage production of a work by Salvatore Di Giacomo. He then entered the film industry and worked as an assistant to Luchino Visconti on La Terra Trema ("The Earth Trembles", 1948) and Senso ("Sense", 1954). He wrote several screenplays, including Bellissima ("Beautiful", 1951) and The City Stands Trial ("Processo alla città", 1952), and shot a few scenes of the film Red Shirts ("Camicie rosse", 1952) by Goffredo Alessandrini. In 1956 he co-directed, with Vittorio Gassman, the film Kean – Genio e sregolatezza ("Kean – Genius and recklessness"), about the Shakespearean actor Edmund Kean. The realist nature of this film caused a stir in alluding to mafia control of the government. Of the film, Rosi himself said, "A director makes his first film with passion and without regard for what has gone before". But David Shipman comments "... but this is in fact a reworking of La Terra Trema, with the Visconti arias replaced by Zavattini's naturalism." The film examined the life of the Sicilian gangster Giuliano, using the technique of a long series of flashbacks. Shipman suggests that the film, with a "superb unity of the landscape and people of Sicily" ... "made Rosi's international reputation."

1970s His 1970 film Many Wars Ago ("Uomini contro") dealt with the futility of war, focusing on the Trentino Front of 1916–17 during World War I, where Italian officers made unrealistic demands of the men under their command. It was based on the novel Un anno sull'altopiano by Emilio Lussu. The lead is played by Mark Frechette and the cost of the film was such that Rosi needed to secure Yugoslavian collaboration. Shipman writes: "The Alpine battlefield has been imaginatively and bloodily re-created, and photographed in steely colours by Pasqualino De Santis, but Rosi's urge to say something important – doubtless intense after the last two films – resulted only in cliché: that military men are fanatics and war is hell." During the preparation of The Mattei Affair Rosi was in contact with Mauro De Mauro, the Sicilian journalist murdered in mysterious circumstances for reasons which, it is suspected, included an investigation on behalf of Rosi, into the death of the president of the Italian state-owned oil and gas conglomerate Eni. and was to win BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1983. Rosi had been invited by the state-owned television service RAI to select a subject for filming, and the four-part television programme was cut into a 141-minute feature film which he described as "a journey through my own conscience". Shipman writes, "the film retains all the mystery of Rosi's best work – an enquiry where at least half the answers are withheld. In this enquiry there is a respect for the historical process, but the usual magisterial blend of art and dialectic is softened by a sympathy much deeper than that of Il Momento Della Verità. The occasional self-conscious shot that we associate with peasantry cannot mar it." and subsequently he worked on Chronicle of a Death Foretold (1987), adapted from the novel by Gabriel García Márquez, which starred Gian Maria Volonté, Ornella Muti, Rupert Everett, Anthony Delon and Lucia Bosè. The film was shot in Mompox, Colombia.

His last film as director was 1997's The Truce, based on holocaust survivor Levi's memoir, and starring John Turturro. Rosi described the film in a 2008 interview with Variety as being about "the return to life."

The 58th edition of the Berlin International Film Festival in 2008 played tribute to Rosi by screening 13 films in its Homage section, a feature being reserved for film-makers of outstanding quality and achievement. He received the Honorary Golden Bear for Lifetime Achievement on 14 February 2008, accompanied by the screening of Salvatore Giuliano.

In 2009 he was awarded the Cavaliere della Legion d'Onore, in 2010 the "Golden Halberd" at the Trieste Film Festival and in May 2012 the Board of the Venice Biennale unanimously approved the proposal of its director Alberto Barber, to award Rosi the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at its 69th show. Barber praised Rosi for his "absolute rigor in historic reconstruction, never making any compromises on a political or ethical level, combined with engaging storytelling and splendid visuals."

On 27 October 2010 he became an honorary citizen of Matelica, the birthplace of Enrico Mattei, while in 2013, in the presence of the Italian Minister of Cultural Heritage Massimo Bra, he was given the honorary citizenship of Matera, where he had shot three of his films. In 2014 he took part in the film Born in the USE, co-produced by Renzo Rossellini and directed by Michele Dioma.

In the last part of his life he lived on the Via Gregoriana in Rome near the Spanish Steps. In April 2010, his wife Giancarla Mandelli died.

Rosi died on 10 January 2015 at the age of 92, whilst at home, as a result of complications from bronchitis.

A memorial service was held in Rome on 10 January with the viewing of the body taking place at the Casa del Cinema, and with many fellow Italian film-makers, including fellow director Giuseppe Tornatore, in attendance. The President of Italy Giorgio Napolitano, Rosi's friend from their schooldays sent roses. The director Giuseppe Piccioni said Rosi's work gave Italy "identity and dignity" continuing, "Rosi was one of those artists who lived his work like a mission."

Director Paolo Sorrentino dedicates his 2015 movie Youth with a simple end credit "For Francesco Rosi".

Legacy The Variety Movie Guide says of Rosi: "Most films by Francesco Rossi probe well under the surface of people and events to establish a constant link between the legal and the illegal exercise of power."

Honours 1995: Cavaliere di gran croce dell'Ordine al merito della Repubblica Italiana 1987: Grande ufficiale dell'Ordine al merito della Repubblica Italiana 2009: Officier de la Légion d'honneur

Filmography

Director Rosi directed 20 films, starting with some scenes in Goffredo Alessandrini's Red Shirts. His last film was The Truce in 1997.

1952 – Red Shirts (Camicie rosse) 1956 – Kean (Kean – Genio e sregolatezza), co-directed with Vittorio Gassman. 1958 – The Challenge (La sfida) 1959 – The Magliari (I magliari) 1962 – Salvatore Giuliano 1963 – Hands over the City (Le mani sulla città) 1965 – The Moment of Truth (Il momento della verità) 1967 – More than a Miracle (C'era una volta...) 1970 – Many Wars Ago (Uomini contro) 1972 – The Mattei Affair (Il caso Mattei) 1973 – Lucky Luciano 1976 – Illustrious Corpses (Cadaveri eccellenti) 1979 – Christ Stopped at Eboli (Cristo si è fermato a Eboli) 1981 – Three Brothers (Tre fratelli) 1984 – Carmen 1987 – Chronicle of a Death Foretold (Cronaca di una morte annunciata) 1989 – 12 registi per 12 città, a collaboration work with 11 other directors. 1989 – The Palermo Connection (Dimenticare Palermo) 1992 – Neapolitan Diary (Diario napoletano) 1997 – The Truce (La tregua)

Writer

Bellissima (1951) The City Stands Trial (1952) Racconti romani (1955) The Bigamist (1956)

Director and screenwriter Original subjects

La sfida (1958) The Magliari (1959) Salvatore Giuliano (1962) Hands over the City (1963) The Moment of Truth (1964) More Than a Miracle (1967) The Mattei Affair (1971) Lucky Luciano (1973) Diario napoletano (1992)

Non-original subjects

Kean – Genio e sregolatezza (1956, subject by Dumas and Sartre) Many Wars Ago (1970, subject by Emilio Lussu) Illustrious Corpses (1976, from the novel by Leonardo Sciascia) Christ Stopped at Eboli (1979, taken from the eponymous novel by Carlo Levi) Three Brothers (1981, based on the story The Third Son by Andrei Platonov") Carmen (1984, taken from the opera by Bizet) Chronicle of a Death Foretold (1987, based on the novel by Gabriel García Márquez) The Palermo Connection (1990, taken from the eponymous novel of Edmonde Charles-Roux) The Truce (1997, taken from the eponymous novel by Primo Levi)

Theatre

Director In Memory of a Lady Friend (Giuseppe Patroni Griffi, 1963) (Eduardo De Filippo, 2003) (Eduardo De Filippo, 2006) Filumena Marturano (Eduardo De Filippo, 2008)