Free three-day festival of Italian cinema spotlights nine new and notable films

PHILADELPHIA – New Italian Cinema Events and Penn Cinema & Media Studies, in collaboration with the Consulate General of Italy in Philadelphia, PI-Philly, Penn Italian Studies, and the Italian Cultural Institute of New York, present the 2023 edition of New Italian Cinema Events film festival.

The festival has been curated by Nicola M Gentili (Penn, Cinema & Media Studies) with N.I.C.E. directors Viviana Del Bianco, Mila Tenaglia, and Matilde Castagnoli, and aims at showing new and original Italian feature films in Philadelphia.

The N.I.C.E. festival is a unique three-day event that spotlights new feature films that show contemporary Italian stories, from crime dramas and personal journeys to comedies played on the edge of an irony that highlights the social difficulties of today’s world, the phenomenon of immigration, sexual diversity, and the various ways and styles of life.

The festival is free and open to all. All film screenings (in Italian with English subtitles) will be held in the Rainey Auditorium at the Penn Museum, 3260 South St. in Philadelphia.

Dec. 1
Noon, “The First Rule.” A glimpse of the historical period we are experiencing: a suburban high school, structures, students and teaching staff are the exemplary mirror of a social and economic depression that seems irreversible.

3 p.m., “An Italian Gourmet Crime Story.” Carmine runs a restaurant to launder dirty money, and finds himself collaborating with Consuelo, a chef in search of perfection.

7 p.m., “The Last Night of Amore.” A police lieutenant named Franco Amore on the night before his retirement is called to investigate a crime scene.

Dec. 2
Noon, “Olimpia’s Way.” A “dance hall road movie” about Olimpia, a legendary ballroom dancer, who, at age 70 dusts off her orchestra’s tour bus.

3 p.m., “Fireworks.” The troubled relationship between Gianni and Nino, set in the narrow-minded and prejudencial Sicily of 1982.

7 p.m., “A Brighter Tomorrow.” A movie director struggles with his relationship with his family, and with his latest movie, about the impact on the Italian Communist Party of the USSR invasion of Hungary in 1956.

Dec. 3
Noon, “Amanda.” Amanda, 24, lives mostly isolated and has never had any friends, even if it’s the thing she wants the most.

3 p.m., “Strangeness.” During a trip to Sicily in 1920, Luigi Pirandello meets Onofrio Principato and Sebastiano Vella, two actors rehearsing a new show.

7 p.m., “Jailbird.” As the son of two inmates Hyacinth was always more at home in prison than in the outside world.