30. Film Festival della Lessinia
Bosco Chiesanuova (Italia)
23 August - 1 September 2024

Italian premiere

The Deer, covered in goat skins with face and hands painted in black; the Martino, a puffin dressed in white with coloured ribbons on the tip of his hat; the janare, horrible masked witches dressed in black; the Maone, an evil character of darkness; the hunter and the Doe are the protagonists of a collective rite that, from time immemorial, has been staged in the square of Castelnuovo al Volturno, on the mountains of the Molise chain of the Mainarde. After sunset, the only square in the town becomes the stage for a pantomime that involves many inhabitants, both as protagonists and as extras. Isolating it in a deserted setting among the streets of the town, accompanied by the incessant sound of cowbells and the background of birdsong that seem to participate in the staging, the film captures this rite in its ancestral essentiality and its hidden meanings: the ancient Dionysian myth, fear of the unreasonable and incomprehensible, the wild violence of Nature that dominates and, at times, overwhelms.

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  Danilo Sergio

  Trained at the IULM University of Milan with degrees in communication, media and advertising, and subsequently in TV, cinema and new media, he continued his studies in management, entrepreneurship and Innovation at the University of Molise. He has worked for television companies and has made numerous short films. Since 2018 he has been working at the Rai Regional Office for Molise.