An animated short to raise awareness among the very young about the topic of food waste: the result is “Pol e Tina” (working title), the work that the Regione Piemonte, as part of its campaign against food waste, has commissioned from the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia animation department in Turin (directed by Michele Tozzi), and also involves La Sarraz which produced the short.
“We had the idea of using this as a prequel for another movie we are producing, “Di Fame non si muore”, by Umberto Spinazzola, which deals with exactly the same subject”, explains Alessandro Borrelli, the founder of La Sarraz.
The presentation of the short at Expo in July, inside the Regione Piemonte pavilion, will also be an opportunity to launch this feature film, currently in the development stage (with the support of the Ministry of the Culture and Rai Cinema, which is also very interested in the project), filming on which should start in the first few months of 2016 in Turin, with the support of the  Film Commission Torino Piemonte.
“It is no coincidence that the protagonist of the short will be Pol, the lead character’s dog in “Di fame non si muore” who, in the animation, behaves just like his owner in the movie, mov- ing around the town trying to discover places where he can find food that has been thrown away despite being of excellent quality.”
Umberto Spinazzola, who knows a lot about food and entertainment (he is the famous director of “Masterchef Italia”, as well as “Masterchef Junior” and “Hell’s Kitchen”), also wrote the screenplay (along with Fabrizio Ievolella, with the collaboration of Alessandro Tedeschi and Federico Calamandra): the story is about an important chef who finds himself bankrupt and experiences a personal and professional crisis which pushes him right to the margins of society.
So he decides to change his life, settling down in an eco-sustainable house in a green space within a suburban area, establishing a survival strategy that leads to him collect excellent quality food that has been thrown away by large scale retailers as well as small traders.
This film is one of the five projects that the Film Commission selected for the day dedicated to meetings and exchanges held on May 5th in Brussels, aimed at offering production companies in Piedmont a series of tools they can use to help their relations with other international producers.
Belgium is the first in a series of European countries where the possibility of new co-productions with Piedmont will be sounded out.
The other projects that took part in the meeting were “Ghost Carousel”, an animated feature for families produced by Animoka, which has already received a special mention as a “script to be recommended to the production world” at the Solinas awards; the feature “Sara e gli altri”, produced by Meibi Servizi e Consulenze Audiovisive and the documentary “Chief White Elk”, written and directed by Beppe Leonetti and produced by Stefilm International.

MOVIE INDUCED TOURISM/Something small but respectable
What will you guys do with Italy?” “Something quite small but very respectable”.
This is how the partisan answers the fascist officer in “Il partigiano Johnny” the novel by the great writer from Piedmont, Beppe Fenoglio, considered by critics to be a masterpiece of resistance literature.
On the seventieth anniversary of the liberation from the fascist regime (1945- 2015) Fenoglio’s work has been “reconstructed” and valorized by Gabriele Pedullà in “Il libro di Johnny”, published by Einaudi.
The initiative set up by the Film Commission Torino Piemonte and financed by the Cultural Department of the Regione Piemonte with the support of the Centro Studi Fenoglio is something that appears to be small, but is certainly respectable.
This time the valorization of the Langhe does not look at truffles or Barolo and Barbaresco wines, but at the memory the land preserves of the partisans’ struggle on the pages written by Fenoglio and in the images of the big screen adaptation of his most famous novel by Guido Chiesa.
A thematic itinerary was organized following in the writer’s footsteps (which will be repeated 5 times between May and September, with the possibility of a visit exclusively in English for Expo tourists) that brings his literature closer to cinema and, in particular, to Guido Chiesa’s film. The movie tourist will be invited by the director to view some scenes that he has chosen from the movie and taken on a trip to see the real locations used for filming (in and around Alba) to learn more about the emotions aroused by the film and the secrets of making it.
The same route will be taken on the day spent with the novel: from the book to the construction of the screenplay which will also take place through a tour around the Centro Studi Fenoglio.
Info: eventi@fctp.it