L'amatore (The Amateur) - Trailer

In 1920s and 1930s Milan, Piero Portaluppi became a successful architect, as well as an enthusiastic filmmaker. His collection of amateur films not only illustrates his career but also gives an impression of a society increasingly under the spell of Mussolini.

A trip through the visual archive of architect Piero Portaluppi, who made a significant impression on the city of Milan with the Hoepli Planetarium, the RAS building and countless villas for well-heeled Milanese in the 1920s and 1930s. The 'amateurism' referred to in the title of this experimental documentary was revealed some years ago thanks to the discovery of a collection of 16mm films, which he shot, edited and supplied with title sequences.

In these short films this man – who at one time kept track of exactly how much soup, meat, wine and salad he consumed in a year – gives an equally tightly controlled impression of his personal and social life during a turbulent period of Italian history. A period during which Portaluppi’s architectural style evolved from Neo-Gothic to Modernism and he rose into elite circles where he found his clients, as well as effortlessly conforming to the dominant ideology of Mussolini's fascism.

Director: Maria Mauti

Writer: Maria Mauti

Producer: Piero Maranghi

Executive producer: Raffaella Milazzo

Associate Producer: Aymar del Amo - zucre films

Cinematography: Ciro Frank Schiappa

Editor: Núria Esquerra, Valentina Andreoli

Sound Design: Paolo Benvenuti, Simone Olivero

Production Company: MP1

Country: Italy

Year: 2016

Length: 90'

Language: Italian

Edited at Zucre Films

Premiered on:

Locarno Film Festival 2016

http://www.pardolive.ch/it/pardo/program/film?fid=891612&eid=69&

IDFA Film Festival 2016

https://www.idfa.nl/industry/tags/project.aspx?id=ee6b49d5-a290-474e-b84b-2b623bbb0d90

International Film Festival Rotterdam 2017

https://iffr.com/en/2017/films/l-amatore