Monte. 2016. Directed by Amir Naderi

Monte (Mountain) A film by Amir Naderi 2016 – Italy/USA/France – 107 minutes – color - in Italian Attori: Andrea Sartoretti Claudia Potenza Zaccaria Zanghellini Sebastian Eisath Anna Bonaiuto

Produced by Carlo Hintermann, Gerardo Panichi, Rino Sciarretta, Eric Nyari Co-Produced by Thierry Lenouvel, Michel Merkt an Italy/USA/France co-production: Citrullo International (Italy), Zivago Media (Italy), Cineric Inc (USA),Ciné-sud Promotion (France), KNM (France) In collaboration with: Rai Cinema Supported by: MiBACT – Direzione Generale Cinema, IDM Südtirol Alto Adige, Friuli Venezia Giulia Film Commission , CNC Nouvelles technologies en production, Regione Lazio-Fondo regionale per il cinema e l’audiovisivo

Plot: Late Middle Ages: Agostino lives in poverty with his wife Nina and son Giovanni outside a small village at the foot of the mountains. An immense mountain rises like a wall, stopping the sun’s rays and thus reducing their farmland to stones and twigs. Despite all suggestions to move away for a better life, Agostino insists his family’s fate lies there between the peaks. He firmly believes that a man’s roots cannot betray him. Agostino struggles in vain to find a solution to better provide for his starving family. But their lives do not improve, and Agostino decides to challenge the ancient mountain’s immensity and power.

Comments from Filmmaker Amir Naderi

I have always put my characters in difficult situations, but this is actually the most difficult situation ever! The main character’s previous generations have never sought to reverse the situation of living in the shadow of the mountain. His ancestors have lived and died there, but Augostino decides to fight his fate, change his destiny. I have done this throughout my life. Augostino’s solution is ultimately to break down the mountain so the sun’s rays will shine through and illuminate his farmland.

I like to test my characters to see how they will survive. At the same time, I test myself as a filmmaker. I’m always inspired by a challenge, that’s what led me to make movies. For the characters and myself, key words are challenge and persistence. We can’t go on living without them. I believe that human beings deserve the chance to make possible anything considered to be impossible. The characters in Monte are very close to those of Cut and my other films: they are faced with achieving the impossible. Things change only when characters do something impossible.

Amir Naderi

“Monte” is Amir Naderi’s first Italian film - shot in Italy and in the Italian language. His previous feature was 2011’s Cut, shot in Japan and entirely in Japanese. Naderi’s 1984 film The Runner gained wide international critical recognition. Since the 1970s, he has been among the most influential figures of New Iranian Cinema. His work has been the subject of retrospectives at museums and film festivals around the world, including the Film Society of Lincoln Center (New York), Turin’s Museum of Cinema (Italy) and at the Busan International Film Festival (Korea). Although Naderi’s early films explored themes within the context of Iranian life and culture, he has cited the aesthetics of Italian neorealist cinema as inspiration: non-studio shooting, the use of nonprofessional actors, looser narrative structures, and a focus on the plight of poor and working-class people. Naderi has produced works of new filmmakers such as Andrei Severny’s Condition (2011), Naghmeh Shirkhan’s Hamsayeh (2010) and Ry Russo Young’s Orphans (2007). He also co-wrote Ramin Bahrani’s 99 Homes (2015). Naderi was born in 1946 and grew up in Abadan, a working-class port city in southern Iran. He emigrated to the United States in the 1990s.

Post-screening conversation with Naderi

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