With Earth Day almost upon us, we’ve decided to spotlight Franco Piavoli’s The Blue Planet, a rarely-seen film attuned to the passing of seasons. With his impressive command of visuals and time, Piavoli patiently outlines connections between life’s microscopic and macroscopic concerns, filming a narrative that unhurriedly makes its way from scenes of ants scaling blades of grass to the moon looming large over a valley.

The Blue Planet, often considered Piavoli’s masterwork, was made after a sudden career hiatus. He had spent the preceding two decades making short documentaries on specific subjects — Surgery (1954), Emigrants (1963), Convicts (1964) — but The Blue Planet awarded him with the opportunity to expand his scope. After its premiere at the 1982 Venice Film Festival, Piavoli’s film earned plaudits from Jean Rouch, Stan Brakhage, and Andrei Tarkovsky.

“Exploring this country that surrounds us from the morainic hills where I live to this beautiful river, the Minicio which comes from Lake Garda which is also a beautiful place, moving around the countryside, I breath in all the charm, all the beauty, all the moments of the day, because it’s clear these are living paintings.” FRANCO PIAVOLI

 

Much of Piavoli’s genius owes itself to his idiosyncratic method of production. He often worked with a limited crew that included his wife, child, and neighbors. Without outside intervention, he developed a unique cinematic language that not only spoke to his personal whims, but also reflected his community’s traditions. The films he made after The Blue Planet, which included an adaptation of The Odyssey and several more season-based films about childhood and adolescence, reinforces his tight bond with his collaborators, whose life and experiences routinely informed Piavoli’s practice.

Franco Piavoli was born in northern Italy in 1933. He started his career as a painter and photographer before pivoting to filmmaking in 1954. His small-scale docu-poems (Sul lago di Garda, The Seasons, Sunday Evening) quickly earned him acclaim, but it was not until he dedicated himself to feature-form filmmaking that Piavoli earned international recognition. After watching The Blue Planet at Venice Film Festival in 1982, Tarkovksy described the film as “a poem, concert, journey into the universe, nature, life… truly a different vision.” This quote fittingly sums up all of Piavoli’s contributions to cinema.

Text written by Nicolas Pedrero-Setzer. Special thanks to Alice Rohrwacher for introducing this film to us, as well as Courtney Muller for her curatorial support and Cinecittà for generously allowing us to present The Blue Planet.