Italian Film Producers and The Challenge of Soviet Coproductions: Franco Cristaldi and The Case of The RED TENT
2020; Routledge; Volume: 40; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/01439685.2020.1715598
ISSN1465-3451
Autores Tópico(s)Historical Geopolitical and Social Dynamics
ResumoThis article explores the little-known history of Italian-Soviet film productions by means of a close analysis of the production history of one such coproduction, The Red Tent (1969). Produced by Franco Cristaldi’s company Vides and the Russian Mosfilm, and directed by Michail Kalatozov, the film featured an international cast including Peter Finch, Sean Connery and Claudia Cardinale. Centred on the story of Umberto Nobile’s calamitous scientific expedition to the Arctic in 1928, the film was as much a product of the easing of East-West tensions in the Khrushchev era as of the growing networks of collaboration in European and international cinema. Documents from the Cristaldi archive are employed to offer a detailed reconstruction of the film’s production from economic, political, logistical and artistic points of view. The challenges were numerous starting with the need to ensure the cooperation of the still-living Nobile. Filming was interrupted following the Russian invasion of Prague in 1968, but nonetheless it was completed and the film found an international distribution, with the American sale making a crucial contribution to the viability of the project. Although, in contrast to the original intention, no further films were made that followed this production model, The Red Tent constitutes a key example of the creativity shown by Italian producers in forging novel patterns of international production.
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