“15-18 Disobbedienti alla Guerra”, by Chiaffredo (Fredo) Valla, produced by Nefertiti and distributed by Istituto Luce, was filmed mid March in the provinces of Trieste and Gorizia with the support of the Friuli Venezia Giulia Film Commission. It is a documentary which aims to shed some light on the cruel way Italy used to punish its soldiers, as we celebrate the anniversary of the Great War.
It is also a time of celebration for the Fondo Regionale per l’Audiovisivo del Friuli Venezia Giulia (which supported the Film, along with the Piemonte Doc Film Fund), as it is celebrating its tenth anniversary in June having approved and supported 334 projects for a total amount of € 4,783,092,106 granted through 19 open calls.
The lion’s share went to documentaries, both in terms of the number of projects as well as the quantity of the contributions disbursed, as the director of the Fund, Paolo Vidali, explains.
There is also a significant presence of documentaries inside the Co- Production Forum When East Meets West, which the Fund organizes in concert with the Trieste Film Festival and where, in the last two years, the main award was won by two documentaries: “the selection of the projects is 50% drama and 50% documentaries”, continues Vidali, “also because there the objective is the production-development of documentaries with a theatrical character, 70 minutes or longer, to be precise”. ‘Cinema festival’ documentaries that “are now only accepted in that format”.  There are many made in FVG products which have enjoyed a good festival journey: amongst these Vidali mentions “ The last resort” by Thanos Anastopolus and David Del Degan (a Mansarda Production, Fantasia and Arizona Productions co-production), a documentary that runs for nearly two hours, that got to La Croisette and was distributed in cinemas in France, “Dancing with Maria” by Ivan Gergolet (produced by Transmedia in co-production with Staragara and Imaginada Film), and “ e Special Need” by Carlo Zoratti, produced by Erika Barbiani of Videomante.
Co-production is an increasingly distinctive trait of the films realized in this region that has made audiovisuals its strong point.
“This is also thanks to initiatives like RE-ACT (the trans-regional initiative dedicated to the co-development of audiovisual projects and the support of new international co-productions involving Friuli Venezia Giulia, Croatia and Slovenia), where there is also a substantial participation of documentaries.
In eastern countries there is a greater concomitance between documentary and drama production due to the great strength of real stories in these regions”.
“ This trend is also increasingly characterizing regional production”, explains Vidali: “ there are many drama films that have a strong documentary-like structure, I am thinking of the movies by Alessandro Comodin, “Summer of Giacomo” and “Happy times will come soon”, as well as “Tir” by Alberto Fasulo.