John D. Calandra Italian American Institute: Academic & Cultural Programs

2007-2008

Documented Italians

This film and video series is co-sponsored by the CUNY TV, the Graduate School of Journalism (CUNY) and the National Italian American Foundation (www.niaf.org), in conjunction with the Pesaro Film Festival’s “New Italian-American Cinema.”

Screenings takes place at the Graduate School of Journalism, 230 West 41^st Street, between 7^th and 8^th Avenues, Room 308, Manhattan.

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

“I Build the Towers” (2005), 87 min.

Edward Landler and Brad Byer, dir.

“I Build the Tower” is the story of the life and work of Sabato “Sam” Rodia, the Italian immigrant who designed and single-handily built in South Central Los Angeles the architectural fantasy that has come to be known internationally as the “Watts Towers.” From the 1920s to the 1950s, Rodia worked without helpers or scaffolding to construct his majestic spires of reinforced concrete rising to a hundred feet on his residential lot of land. He decorated them with a stunning mosaic of tile, seashells, pottery, ceramics, rocks, and glass, including broken 7-Up and Milk of Magnesia bottles. Rodia’s Watts Towers have come to be recognized as an artistic and engineering masterpiece world-wide. In 1990, the United States Department of the Interior designated Rodia’s creation a National Historic Landmark.

Post-screening discussion with the director led by Joseph Sciorra, Calandra Institute.

Monday, October 1, 2007

“Hand of God” (2006), 96 min.

Joseph Cultrera, dir.

How does a film about Catholic clergy abuse not descend into depression? It helps when the victim doesn’t act like one but uses his own intellect and humor to fight back. Unlike any other look at this topic, “Hand of God” is a poetic and provocative tale of one survivor and his family. Beyond the headlines, statistics and ecclesiastical spin, filmmaker Joseph Cultrera grounds the story of his brother Paul in the details of their Sicilian-American Catholic upbringing in Salem, Massachusetts. From baptism to abuse; silence to dialogue; resignation to action, the film follows one person’s internal and external journey from potential priest to scathing critic.

Post-screening discussion with the director led by James T. Fisher, Fordham University.

Monday, November 5, 2007

“Prisoners in Paradise” (2003), 58 min.

Camilla Calamandrei, dir.

During World War II more than 51,000 Italian soldiers were brought to the United States as prisoners of war. Camilla Calamandrei’s documentary “Prisoners in Paradise,” traces the previously untold story of these young men, their romances and friendships with American women, and their significant but unrecognized contribution to the Allied war effort. Featuring rare period footage of POW camps, “Prisoners in Paradise” features six Italian POWs, and the women they met, and their experiences in America during and after the war. Ultimately, the film offers a provocative meditation on the meaning of national identity in times of peace and war.

Post-screening discussion with the director led by Peter Vellon, Queens College.

Monday, December 3, 2007

“Saints and Sinners” (2003), 80 min.

Abigail Honor, dir.

After living together for seven years in New York City, Edward DeBonis and Vincent Maniscalco decide to get married. But unlike many other gay couples who formalize their relationship in a domestic union, Vincent and Edward, both devout Catholics, will settle for nothing short of the “Holy Sacrament of Marriage.” This Italian-American couple’s request to The New York Times to announce their Catholic wedding in the weekly “Styles” section is another controversial element in the preparation of this momentous occasion. As America engages in often heated debate about the legal acceptance of gay and lesbian unions, “Saints and Sinners” explores the social, political, and religious aspects of same-sex marriage and examines its effect on American society.

Post-screening discussion with the director led by Peter Savastano, Seaton Hall University and Drew University.

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

“Nine Good Teeth” (2003), 80 min.

Alex Halpern, dir.

“Nine Good Teeth” unfolds through the stories of 103-year-old Brooklyn-born, Sicilian-American Mary Mirabito. In an intimate and often hilarious portrait, the fiercely independent and outspoken Mary dispenses homespun wisdom in a series of unflinching conversations with her persistent and equally outspoken grandson director Alex Halpern. Mary’s desire, from an early age, to live her life equal to that of a man, was often in direct conflict with her roles as daughter, wife, mother, matriarch and first-generation American. As she divulges family secrets and rivalries, Mary confronts her own mortality with candor and courage while remaining the rock on which the rest of her family relies. Perhaps what is most remarkable about the documentary is Halpern’s insistence on ferreting out the most painful aspects of his family mythology in an irreverent, uncompromising fashion.

Post-screening discussion with the director led by Edvige Giunta, New Jersey City University.

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

“Watch the Pallino” (2007), 42 min.

Stephanie Foerster, dir.

At the turn of the twentieth century, Italian immigrants found jobs in the coalmines in the rural town of Toluca, Illinois. On Sundays afternoons, the Italian miners and their families gathered to play the game of bocce, competing for a bottle of wine or wheel of cheese. Today, Toluca maintains this convivial spirit by hosting, during the Labor Day weekend, what is arguably the largest bocce tournament of its kind in the country and probably one of the most raucous. “Watch the Pallino” uncovers the history of Toluca’s passion for bocce, and follows avid bocce players and organizers over the course of the daylong tournament, all the way to the finals. This documentary film showcases how the Italian game of lawn bowls became a small town passion in middle America.

Post-screening discussion with the director led by Joseph Sciorra, Calandra Institute.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

“Louis Prima: The Wildest!” (2000), 82 min.

Don McGlynn, dir.

Jazz trumpeter and consummate showman Louis Prima came to epitomize the night club and lounge scene of the 1950s and 1960s while reaching American homes through television appearances and recordings. His successful act juxtaposed Prima’s exuberant performances with the deadpan shtick of his wife singer Keely Smith. His Italian-American numbers “Felicia No Capicia” and “Bacciagaloop (Makes Love on the Stoop),” among others brought a playful sense of ethnicity to a national audience. The film “Louis Prima: The Wildest!” documents Prima’s Sicilian upbringing in New Orleans where he absorbed the styles of Louis Armstrong and King Oliver to his Las Vegas shows to his performance as King Louis in Disney’s 1967 animated adaptation of “The Jungle Book.” Archival footage and interviews with Keeley Smith, saxophonist Sam Butera, author Nick Tosches, among others, reveals an influential yet underrated musical talent.

Post-screening discussion with producer Joseph Lauro led by Anthony Tamburri, Calandra Institute.

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

“My Brother, My Sister, Sold for a Fistful of Lire,” (1998), 90 min.

Basile Sallustio, dir.

In 1952, Pia Dilisa was ten-years-old when she last saw her younger brother Dominic and sister Antoinetta perched atop a donkey leaving their mountain village in Molise forever. Her widowed and destitute father had renounced his paternity of the two children handing them over to an Italian/American Catholic adoption agency, which in turn “sold” the children to Americans for $10,000 a head. Nearly fifty years later, contadina Dilisa is desperate and determined to locate her siblings and uncover the machinations of this clandestine operation. Her investigation begins at her local church, where the 96-year-old priest lambasts Dilisa for her questions, to the Vatican, and finally to New York and Chicago. Director Basile Sallustio, Dilisa’s nephew by marriage, follows his resolute aunt while bringing to light the trafficking of tens of thousands of Italian children between 1945 and 1965.

Post-screening discussion with the director led by Jane Schneider, CUNY Graduate Center.

Presentations begin at 6 PM.

All events are free. Seating is limited.