CASOTTO

One summer Sunday on the beach of Ostia, a group of people gather around a cabin on a public beach (the “casotto” of the title): a female basketball team, two grandparents trying to get their pregnant granddaughter to marry her dumb cousin, two male prostitutes trying to pick people up, two sisters who have a date with a functionary, and a solitary heart in search of love... The restoration of the film was curated by the CSC – Cineteca Nazionale in 2023, for presentation at the Festival.

“One day, I was watching Una domenica d’agosto by Luciano Emmer on TV. There was a beach, actors, and I saw a very close up of the two protagonists in front of the movie camera who were doing their best to tell lies, say meaningless things, whereas way in the back, without a doubt hidden off-screen, there was an assistant director who was making these extras move around, back and forth; behind them were more people who would go into the cabins and then come back out after a while. It was a long sequence and I became curious as I watched these people in the background, and I said “Well! Those people are doing the most honest thing of all of them, and what might they be doing? There, that one entered the cabin: what's he doing in there? That one came out, that other one is passing by. I got curious and I decided to make a story about people who don't do anything.”

DIRECTOR: Sergio Citti. STORY: Vincenzo Cerami. SCREENPLAY: Vincenzo Cerami, Sergio Citti. CINEMATOGRAPHY: Tonino Delli Colli. EDITING: Nino Baragli. PRODUCTION DESING: Dante Ferretti. MUSIC: Gianni Mazza. CAST: Ugo Tognazzi, Mariangela Melato, Anna Melato, Gigi Proietti, Franco Citti, Jodie Foster, Michele Placido, Paolo Stoppa, Flora Carabella, Marco Marsili, Gianrico Tondinelli, Massimo Bonetti, Carlo Croccolo, Cathy Marchand, Ninetto Davoli, Clara Algranti, Julia Sebestyan, McKenzie Bailey, Catherine Deneuve, Gianni Rizzo, Gino Barzacchi, Franca Scagnetti. PRODUCTION: Mauro Berardi.