Mazzacurati, Carlo

(1956-)

   Director and screenwriter. One of the first directors to be hailed as a representative of the New Italian Cinema, Mazzacurati studied at the DAMS (Faculty of Comunication) in Bologna before self-financing his first short film, Vagabondi (Vagabonds, 1979). After working for television and collaborating on the screenplay of what would later become Gabriele Salvatores's Marrakech Express (1989), he secured the support of Nanni Moretti's newly established Sacher Film company for his first feature, Notte Italiana (Italian Night, 1987). An atmospheric tale of crime and corruption set in the Po delta area of the Italian north-east, the film was highly praised and earned Mazzacurati the Nastro d'argento for Best New Director. His second feature, Il prete bello (The Handsome Priest, 1989), was generally regarded as lackluster and disappointing, but his talent appeared to be reconfirmed with Un'altra vita (Another Life, 1992) and Il toro (The Bull, 1994), an interesting variation on the road movie that recounted the story of two male friends attempting to transport a stolen stud bull to Hungary in hopes of making a huge profit. The bittersweet comedy was awarded the Silver Lion at the Venice Festival that year, and two years later his Vesna va veloce (Vesna Goes Fast, 1996), the tragic story of a Czech girl's attempts to remain in Italy, was also nominated for the Golden Lion. L'estate di Davide (David's Summer, 1998), a powerful but unsentimental coming-of-age film originally made for television, was followed by the tragicomic La lingua del santo (Holy Tongue, 1999) and A cavallo della tigre (Riding the Tiger, 2002), in which Mazzacurati continued to explore the life of eccentric individuals living on the social fringes. His most recent film, L'amore ritrovato (An Italian Romance, 2004), is a more conventional love story adapted from a novel by Carlo Cassola.