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Italian filmmaker Nanni Moretti made it clear why he was poking fun at Netflix in his latest Cannes film entry. A brighter tomorrow.
There’s a moment in the film when Moretti’s doppelganger filmmaker is debating with a Netflix streaming executive: The suit demands that he clear up his story in two minutes. But the director doesn’t give up: What about the first 10? The first 37 minutes? The scene also teases that there are no more Italian movie stars.
At today’s press conference for a brighter morning Moretti explained that he was not only specifically denouncing Netflix, but that he had blown away all streamers with their penetration into the cinema. Moretti also happens to be a cinema owner.
“There is something I dislike: a number of directors and screenwriters just give in to the platforms, they bow to the platforms,” Moretti said at this AM’s Cannes press conference for the title in the competition.
“As far as I’m concerned, I think we should remain emotionally, psychologically and economically committed to a cinema,” the director continued.
“I have a movie that comes to mind; They won’t think of a 13-year-old in Pennsylvania watching on their cell phone while riding the subway,” Moretti said of his audience.
“When I think about making a film, I go to the cinema where audiences come to see bigger pictures, and I continue to write scripts and make films with cinemas in mind.”
The film follows a failed Italian film director Giovanni as he finds himself in a late career crisis trying to film his passion project about the Italian Communist Party’s standoff with the Soviets over the 1956 invasion of Hungary. A brighter tomorrow a film within a film will be billed. Giovanni’s marriage is in limbo to his producer Paola, who pays her bills by producing a violent gangster film to which he objects. Ultimately, she asks him for a divorce through her therapist.
Moretti said he originally drafted part of the script several years ago, focusing on the 1956 incident. “We didn’t get around to writing the script, so I gave up on that idea,” he told the room.
However, when he reconnected with the screenwriter, he tried to explore all facets of the life of the director who directed this 1956 film (meaning himself, Moretti).
Netflix has distributed some quality Italian Oscar submissions, including that of Paolo Sorrentino The hand of God which was nominated for Best International Film in 2022, and the Sophia Loren film, the life before us In it, Diane Warren wrote the song “Io Si (Seen)”, which was nominated for an Original Song nomination.
Moretti won the Palme d’Or for A son’s room in 2001.