The documentary “I Was Born Rosellini” was shown at the Venice Film Festival last year and will be premiered in Latvia on October 14 as part of the Riga International Film Festival. Personal and self-ironic documentary therapy – a view of the “dynasty’s destiny” with a family scattered in Italy, Sweden, the USA, India and the Middle East. The film’s director and “patient” in one person is the photographer and former drug addict Alessandro. He calls the existence of his outsider the curse of the Rosellini family – to become a genius or to accept being in the shadow of other successes.
“When choosing the title of the film, I wanted to pair it with a surname that has gone down in film history, thanks to the revolutionary ideas of my grandfather, director Roberto Rosellini, but which has always been very troublesome for me. All the syphilis in the world still call my grandfather a prophet, but he was also well known for his extremely passionate private life. His talent and charisma attracted journalists, creating a huge media circus around him. That’s why our family album includes both glossy photos and sensational movie magazines. All this had a very serious impact on my life and the rest of Rosellini’s life, even when Roberto Rosellini himself was gone, ”says the film’s director Alessandro Rosellini.
The Italian director Roberto Rosellini was a rather complicated father to his children. His scandalous romance with women at the time (including Hollywood actress Ingrid Bergman) took over the front pages of newspapers and left behind a number of ethnically diverse descendants. Alesandro, the director’s eldest grandson, has an uneven career as a photographer and a long history of drug addiction. Unable to keep up with the bar imposed by his grandfather-genius surname, he decides to make a film about the Rosellini saga at the age of 55, gathering his famous relatives with perseverance and irony for an almost impossible family therapy in front of a switched-on movie camera.
The director of the film “I Was Born Rosellini” is the grandson of the famous Italian cinematographer Roberto Rosellini Alesandro Rosellini, and the Latvian film team participated in its creation: producer Uldis Cekulis, the main cameraman Valdis Celmins and co-author Dāvis Sīmanis. The color correction of the film was performed by Krišs Roziņš, the graphic design was by Nauris Ašenkampfs from the studio “Jauda”. The film poster has also been created by Latvian artist Katrīna Vasilevska. On the Latvian side, the film was made with the support of the National Cinema Center.
Tickets in advance (4.00 EUR, 3.00 EUR for pupils, students and pensioners) for the film screening can be purchased at the Info Center of the Liepāja Latvian Society House from October 13 and one hour before the film screening.
The organizer of the event can provide a cinema screening visit only to persons who:
- have been vaccinated against Covid-19;
- have contracted Covid-19 in the last six months.
