Diptych

"Dittico" is a diptych on the Eternal City of Rome composed of part one, "Amoroma", and part two, "Europa" ("Europe"). The first part, showing the ancient's world overlay by the Renaissance, tells the story of the great emperor to come Germanicus, who was murdered at the age of 34 while Jesus Christ was going to be crucified on Golgotha (the numbering of the Christian calendar not being exact), and Germanicus' stepfather Tiberius dwelling in waisting Rome's population. The second part shows some of the Italian Risorgimento's main events, the defence of Rome in 1849 and the landing of Garibaldi's troops at Marsala in 1860, and is itself cut in two parts, the second part of which is dedicated to contemporary Rome during the Covid-19 crisis.

  • Antonio Annunziata
    Director
    Vesuvio-Project, Monster
  • Antonio Annunziata
    Writer
    You and Me, Vesuvio-Project, Monster
  • Antonio Annunziata
    Cinematographer
    Vesuvio-Project
  • Antonio Annunziata
    Editor
    Vesuvio-Project, Rossellini's Actuality, Monster
  • Project Title (Original Language):
    Dittico
  • Project Type:
    Documentary, Experimental, Short, Web / New Media
  • Runtime:
    23 minutes
  • Completion Date:
    December 8, 2021
  • Country of Origin:
    Italy
  • Country of Filming:
    Italy
  • Language:
    English, Italian
  • Shooting Format:
    Video 6K
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Black & White and Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
Director Biography - Antonio Annunziata

Antonio Annunziata (Munich, 1987) lives and works in Rome. In 2015 he graduates in Comparative Literature, Theatre and Philosophy at Ludwig-Maximilian University of Munich (LMU), with a thesis on the Poetics of Revolutionary Storycism Around 1800, and specialises in History and Theory of Cinema at the Institute of Theatre, and Philosophy of History at the Department of Philosophy. From his first term of studies onwards, he works as Tutor of French Letters for LMU’s Department of Romance Studies, and conducts two seminars with cinematic topics at LMU’s Institute of Comparative Literature. Still a student, between 2012 and 2013 he translates and edits, in collaboration with Elisabeth Zoja, the poems’ book One Year Spoken Out of the Night by Peter Handke for Moretti & Vitali. In 2016 he shoots his first experimental short-movie, Monster; or, Bride of Frankenstein, proposing a new method of presenting a fashion collection. He goes on experimenting in search for a digital aesthetic by shooting, between 2016 and 2018, a series of experimental documentaries, all of which have been collected by his Vesuvio-Project.

He has worked as translator and subtitler for cinema diffusion, and collaborated with Adriano Aprà by editing the cinema magazine Quaderni del CSCI 2018, and developing a PowerPoint’s concept as essay-film by creating a comprehensive overview of Roberto Rossellini’s œuvre. The PowerPoint Rossellini’s Actuality has been premiered at the IV Fronteira Festival Internacional do Filme Documentário e Experimental 2018. Still in 2018, he has been member of the Cultural Society Fuorinorma, chaired by Adriano Aprà to promote the new Italian cinema. In the same year, he is assistant director to Gianfranco Giagni for the documentary Dreams, Sex, and Broken Hearts (Readers’ Letters Tell) produced by Istituto Luce-Cinecittà. Furthermore, he directs the crowdfunding campaign Cashmere Revolution for his sister Maddalena Annunziata’s new brand, which accomplishes the prefixed goal to collect 20.000 €.

In 2019 he applies, in collaboration with Francesco Paolo Montini, owner of Movie Factory of Rome, for the VIII Biennale College Cinema with a feature-film project called You and Me, and works in tourism’s business at the Archaeological Park of the Appian Way. In 2021 he finishes writing his first feature-film You and Me, unpublished, and releases online the 2021- Cut of his Vesuvio-Project, along with an experimental-informative Diptych shot between 2019 and 2021, including the titles Amoroma (2019) and Europe (2020-2021). In 2022 he releases online one further entitled Roma, and goes back to work in tourism. In 2023 he produces and shoots his first short-drama entitled You and Me, based on the homonymous movie’s screenplay. The short is bent to participate in major international festivals, and be screened as pilot of the feature-length’s film project.

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Director Statement

This diptych has been shot from 2019-2021. It shows three great epochs of the Eternal City of Rome: the ancient world, the Renaissance, the Risorgimento, and contemporary Rome.