Top 100 Most Anticipated Foreign Films of 2022: #57. Gianni Amelio’s Il signore delle formiche

Il signore delle formiche

Septuagenarian Gianni Amelio is showing zero signs of slowing down quickly after 2020’s Hammamet he climbed onto a film that could stir up Italy’s past with Il signore delle formiche. The Italian filmmaker who once worked as an assistant director for Liliana Cavani has competed for the Palme d’Or once in his career with The Stolen Children but obviously has a better track record at Venice debuting his feature Blow to the Heart (1982), and winning the Golden Lion for The Way We Laughed (1998). Reteaming with his La tenerezza actor Elio Germano, Il signore delle formiche is the biopic of Italian poet, playwright and director Aldo Braibanti, who was jailed in 1968 due to a Fascist-era anti-gay law. Luigi Lo Cascio (of The Best of Youth fame), and raising starlet Sara Serraiocco topline the project which went into production in May of 2021 in Rome. Here he reteams with cinematographer Luan Amelio – they two both worked Hammamet. Kavac Film’s Simone Gattoni will produce the film.

Gist: Braibanti was convicted after a complaint from his partner’s father, who later forced his son to be treated with electroconvulsive therapy in an ill-conceived attempt to rid him of his homosexuality. The Fascist-era law that punished Braibanti, which made it a crime to lead innocent or unwary people “morally” astray, was repealed in 1981.

Release Date/Prediction: Venice Film Festival premiere competing for the Golden Lion.