Michelangelo Antonioni: He is considered as one of the greatest Italian film-makers of his time who redefined the concept of narrative cinema. While studying political economics in Bologna, he painted and wrote criticism for Cinema, the official Fascist film magazine edited by Mussolinis son, Vittorio. This love for art and cinema probably made him choose a career in film-making. And thank heavens it did. Having decided on a film career, he worked with the directors Roberto Rossellini and Marcel Carné, among others. His earliest short films were- Gente del Po (1947), La funivia del Faloria (1950), and La villa dei mostri (1950). He challenged the traditional way of storytelling in Italian cinema through his earlier movies - Story of a Love Affair (1950) or The Lady Without Camelias (1953) or Le amiche (1955). His biggest success was probably the trilogy LAvventura (1960), La Notte (1961), and LEclisse (1962), with which he won several prizes. He started to get offers from USA which allowed him to make three English movies: e.g. Blow-Up (1966) in London and Zabriskie Point (1970) in the USA as well as The Passenger (1975). His final projects were - 1. Michelangelo Eye to Eye was a 35-minute documentary, 2. Eros, a 2004 Italian drama film consisting of three short segments directed by Antonioni, Steven Soderbergh, and Wong Kar-Wai. In 1995, Antonioni received an honorary Lifetime Achievement Academy Award. He passed away at the age of 94 on July 30, 2007, in Rome.
Posted on: Tue, 25 Mar 2014 09:28:49 +0000