The Julian director Franco Giraldi, who passed away a few months ago, would have recently turned 90: the cinematographic works that Giraldi dedicated to Istria are the subject of a new publication by the film critic and National Vice President of the Anvgd Alessandro Cuk. “The Istrian trilogy in Franco Giraldi's cinema” is the title of the publication, of which we publish the introduction with the kind permission of Alcione Editore.

 

The project to create this publication started three years ago with the aim of taking a further step in the study
of the relationship between cinema and the eastern border. After the two monographs, concerning the two historical and fundamental films on the subject, namely La città dolente (1949) by Mario Bonnard and Cuori senza frontiere (1950) by Luigi Zampa, the next stage turned to the cinema of Franco Giraldi.

An author who between the Seventies and Nineties had created a significant trilogy with La rosa rossa (1973) based on the novel by Pier Antonio Quarantotti Gambini, Un anno di scuola (1977) based on the story by Giani Stuparich and La frontiera (1996) based on the book by Franco Vegliani. Therefore a cinematographic work that derives fully from a quality literary transposition and that deals with different times and angles of life on the frontier.
But the author born in 1931 in Comeno (then Italy, now Slovenia) has also touched on border issues in some of his works.
documentaries. This happened with La città di Zeno (1978), with Trieste 1948 (1992) and with Ex Jugoslavia – foglie di viaggio (1994). However, his debut short film from 1960 also has this setting and is entitled Il Carso (The Karst). A work that was thought to be lost and which was rediscovered in 2020.

The project then went ahead and unfortunately, while it was in an advanced stage of production, the news of Franco Giraldi's death was received, last December 2, and this slightly changed the direction of the publication, adding, in addition to the tribute, also a memory of this great author of Italian cinema, perhaps sometimes not valued as he deserved.

His first professional contact with the world of cinema took place as a film critic, although previously,
with his friends Tullio Kezich and Callisto Cosulich, he is among the founders of the Circolo del Cinema di Trieste. But the Julian city is too small for him and he leaves for Rome where he will begin his career as assistant director of prestigious authors, including Sergio Leone in A Fistful of Dollars. And his debut as a director (and his subsequent films) take place under the sign of the western.

Then a change of genre, successfully trying his hand at Italian comedy, directing high-level actors, including Ugo Tognazzi and Monica Vitti. But as soon as he could, Giraldi returned to his homeland with this Julian, Istrian and Dalmatian trilogy that changed his professional life forever, bringing a qualitative turn to his career. He managed to capture themes and atmospheres that probably no one else could have told so adequately, with this measure and attention.

Giraldi was a kind man, a gentleman from another time, everyone recognizes him. In January 2007, when an important retrospective took place as part of the Trieste Film Festival, I had the opportunity to get to know him better. We talked a lot, we ate together, between one film and another, we shared some screenings. We were together to comment on that incredible queue that had formed, in front of the Ariston cinema, waiting to see Un anno di scuola, a little-known Trieste film.

And then we saw each other the following March when another festival took place in Venice, curated by the National Union of Italian Film Critics and the Cinema Circuit of the Municipality of Venice. The initiative, entitled “Franco Giraldi. A cinema of the frontier” included a selection of films and cinematographic documentaries. On that intense day of March 29, at 17 pm The red rose was presented, at 19 pm The green jacket and at 21 pm the meeting with the director. Followed by the screening of The frontier.

Then we spoke again, several times, especially in that period because I was producing a publication on Il cinema di frontiera – Il confine orientale, but also later. We saw each other in Rome, but above all we met several times at the Premio Amidei, in Gorizia, where he was at home. A person endowed with an uncommon courtesy and elegance and capable of great irony.

This book aims to be a further insight into an author who has created a significant piece of cinema connected to the eastern border, transporting three great literary texts to the screen, with finesse and style.

These are cinematographic works that should be recovered and fully re-evaluated, especially The Red Rose which had a great success.
critical feedback and A school year that is difficult to see.

[Introduction by Alessandro Cuk]

Alessandro Cuk, The Istrian Trilogy in Franco Giraldi's Cinema, Alcione, Venice 2021, 175 pp.