The Palermo director Roberto Andò sets his new film «L’abbaglio», released today, in 1860, when Giuseppe Garibaldi began the adventure of the Thousand from Quarto, surrounded by the enthusiasm of young idealists who came from all the regions of Italy . The film was previewed to the press yesterday at the Rouge et Noir cinema in Palermo, in the presence of the director Roberto Andò himself, together with Salvo Ficarra, Valentino Picone and Giulia Andò, the director’s daughter and actress in the cast.
After the previous experience of the film «La Stranezza», Andò once again chooses a team that he defines as “winning”, namely the one composed of Salvo Ficarra, Valentino Picone and Toni Servillo. «There was a strong idea that could only be embodied in this trio», explains the director, who continues, speaking of Ficarra and Picone: «They are so important and have a connection with the public, they created a dramaturgy starting from a Sicilian philosophy. Despite having this success, they want to experiment with a dimension that goes further. I’m not surprised that Ronconi called them. If Fellini had been alive, he would certainly have turned to them.”
«When we started this film it seemed like not even a day had passed since La Stranezza – say Ficarra and Picone – it’s an experience that has enriched us, also because in Toni’s case, it’s like playing with Maradona. Toni is someone, one might say by making a comparison, who works in the locker room. This is in fact an ensemble film in which there is someone who knew how to do the dressing room.”
In the film – whose story and screenplay are by Roberto Andò, together with Ugo Chiti and Massimo Gaudioso – Ficarra and Picone play the roles of Domenico Tricò and Rosario Spitale, two soldiers of Sicilian origins, recruited for Garibaldi’s expedition, who they decide to leave for Sicily, not so much to embrace the patriotic cause, but to join their two loves. Garibaldi’s loyalist, Colonel Vincenzo Giordano Orsini is Toni Servillo. Garibaldi is played, however, by Tommaso Ragno. The cast also includes the Palermo actor Vincenzo Pirrotta and Giulia Andò, in the role of Assuntina.
«In the past we argued a lot off set – says the director’s daughter – on this occasion I can say that we had a lot of fun. We took advantage of the advantages of knowing each other very well.”
The film is «an episode of the Risorgimento seen more closely to the voice of the people – explains Andò – Garibaldi was perhaps the first to attract and dialogue not only with the masses, but one could say that he was the first populist of modernity. He also had a privileged relationship with writers too. Dumas, for example, followed Garibaldi and it was he himself who created his myth in Europe. He had the details of the battle told and then he invented a little.”
Photography is entrusted to Maurizio Calvesi. «Together with him – continues the director – we posed the problem of inventing a new iconography starting from everything that has been transmitted to us, not only in painting, but also in cinema. It is a film that proposes a green Sicily, full of water. A different Sicily”, concludes Andò.