Thought this might be of interest to the group.
JPC

----- Original Message -----
From: Tag Gallagher
To: Habich Christiane;jpc077@...;winfried Günther;pierre gras;Juan
Gorostidi
Munguía;JQuandt@...;Laurence_Kardish@...;richardlippe12@...;f_\
lopez@...;Bodo Schönfelder;Janet Bergstrom;g.laprevotte@...
Sent: 9/13/2006 9:38:55 AM
Subject: Straub News from the Venice Film Festival





A new film by Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet, Quei loro incontri
("Those encounters of theirs"), had its world premier a few days ago in
competition at the Venice Film Festival. The movie's dialogue consists of the
last five dialogues of Cesare Pavese's Dialoghi con Leucò ("Dialogues with
Leuco"). The Straubs did not show up for their press conference; instead they
sent a bunch of their actors who left Pisa at 4 a.m. to be there. Festival
director Marco Müller announced Danièle was ill and that Straub had sent a
statement, which one of the actresses read:

Three messages
Jean-Marie Straub

First) It’s come too soon for our death - too late for our life.
Anyway, I thank Marco Müoller for his courage. But what do I expect from
it? Nothing. Nothing at all? Yes, a small revenge. A revenge “against the
intrigues of the court,” as is said in The Golden Coach. Against so many
ruffians.
Why Pavese? Because he wrote: “Communist doesn’t mean just wanting to be.
We’re too ignorant in this country. We need communists who aren’t ignorant, who
don’t spoil the name.” Or again: “If once it was enough to have a bonfire to
make it rain, or to burn a vagabond on one to save a harvest, how many owners’
houses need to be burnt down, how many owners killed in the streets and squares,
before the world turns just and we have our words to say?”
Pavese has the bastard say: “The other day I passed by the Mora. The pine
tree by the gate’s not there anymore.” Replies Nuto: “The bookkeeper had it cut
down -- Nicoletto, that ignorant man. He had it cut down because the tramps
would stop in its shade and beg, you understand…”
Again Nuto, elsewhere: “With the living he makes, I can't hold it against
him. If it were useful, the first need is for the government to burn money and
anyone who defends it.”
Best wishes.

Second) Besides I wouldn’t be able to be festive in a festival where there are
so many public and private police looking for a terrorist - I am the terrorist,
and I tell you, paraphrasing Franco Fortini: so long as there’s American
imperialistic capitalism, there’ll never be enough terrorists in the world.

Third) I have been: 1. at the Venice Festival (as journalist) in 1954, I chose
to write on three films: Sancho Dayu - El Rio y la Muerte - Rear Window. No
prizes!
2. At the Festival (short films) in 1953 with my first film Machorka-Muff (‘62):
no prize.
3. At the Festival in ‘66 with Nichtversöhnt (Not Reconciled, 1965). Projection
paid for by Godard!
4. At the Festival with Chronicle of Anna Magdalena Bach !
5. At Venice for retrospective in 1975 (wanted by Gambetti) of all our films up
to Moses and Aron (included), 1974.
At the Festival of Cinematographic Art with Quei loro incontri for A Roaring
Lion.

Marco then closed the Press Conference without any of the actors getting a
chance to say a word. (Straub's quotes from Pavese are from Pavese's La luna e
i falò [The moon and the bonfires], which the Straubs filmed in 1979 as part of
Dalla nube alla resistenza [From the cloud to the Resistance].)

2) This caused a furor in the Italian press and at the festival. Virtually
unreported outside of Italy. Nontheless the jury (headed by Catherine Deneuve,
probably inspired by Paolo Branco) wanted to give a special Roaring Lion to the
Straubs. But one jury member, American Cameron Crowe objected because of 9/11
and consented to the award on his understanding that the Festival would
"distance" itself from Straub's "anti-American" message. (Apparently it's
anti-American to oppose imperialism.)

3) The award was given -- for "innovation in language" (in essence, for their
lives' work), but the announcement of "distance" was not made -- thank
goodness! We have nothing to fear from the world being filled with "terrorists"
such as Straub defines himself -- people making movies like Straub. But we have
everything to fear from neo-McCarthyism like Crowe's, that seeks to hinge an
artist award on an endorsement of imperialism.

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