Saturday, March 18 at 4.30PM, at the Bookshop in Piazza della Libertà (Bergamo), it will take place a round table about the director Miloš Forman, protagonist of the full retrospective of BFM 35.
Speakers: Massimiliano Capella, Roberto Manassero, Anton Giulio Mancino, Emanuela Martini, Jean-Sébastien Massart, Angelo Signorelli e Massimo Tria.
Forman was born in Čáslav, a small city in eastern Bohemia – in the former Czechoslovakia – on February 18, 1932. He was one of the main directors of the Nová Vlna (New Wave), the renaissance of Czechoslovak cinema during the 60s.
After winning Locarno Film Festival with his feature film Cerný Petr (Black Peter, 1963), in 1965 he directed Lásky Jedné Plavovlásky (Loves of a Blonde). Oscar-nominated and featured in major festivals (Venice, London, New York), the film launched Forman on the international scene.
In 1968, shortly before the invasion of Czechoslovakia, Forman moved to the United States.
The fiasco of his first Hollywood film, Taking Off (1971), dragged Forman into a state of severe depression. In 1973 Michael Douglas introduced him to Ken Kesey’s novel “One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest”, from which the director adapted the film of the same name starring Jack Nicholson. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest won 5 Oscars: best picture, director, screenplay, male and female actors in a leading role. Institutional violence, moralism, Puritanistic ideology vs. transgression, madness, diversity: the themes of oppression and opposition to the established order continue to permeate the poetry of the Czech author.
The film was a major blockbuster, Forman became a celebrity and, in 1977, he acquired American citizenship. He then directed the musical Hair in 1979 whereas 1984 is the year of Amadeus, which tells story of the troubled relationship between Mozart and Antonio Salieri. The film won 8 Oscars: best picture, director, actor in a leading role, screenplay, costumes, sound, makeup and set design. In 2002, a 180′ Director’s Cut version of Amadeus is released.
His following feature films are Valmont (1984), adapted from “Dangerous liasons” by Laclos and The People vs. Larry Flynt(1996), biopic about the pornographic magazine tychoon, awarded with the Golden Bear in Berlin. Another biopic is Man on the Moon (1999), the story of American actor and comedian Andy Kaufman – one of the most famous interpreters of anti-humour – featuring an outstanding Jim Carrey. After a long string of successes, in 2006 Forman – currently in retirement due to a severe condition affecting his right eye – shot what likely will be his last film: Goya’s Ghosts, starring Javier Bardem and Natalie Portman, where the Spanish painter is portrayed as a witness of some of the most dramatic events of his era.
Bergamo Film Meeting will screen all films by the Czech master. Part of the retrospective will subsequently be hosted at the Cineteca di Bologna.
In cooperation with the Czech Centre of Milan.
Free admission
