A journalist from Bergamo who left a legacy that is largely still to be discovered, among other things, the creator of the Festival of auteur cinema which for a time took place in Sanremo. It’s Nino Zucchelli. A docu-film, which recalls his life and activity, will be screened this afternoon at 3 pm at the Ariston in Sanremo on the day of his birth on November 17, 1913. It is “I am Nino and I will never die” by director Antonio Iorio. The initiative is organized and promoted by the Bergamo Lions Host Club of which Zucchelli was one of the founders in 1953.
The film is the result of a free project and the production was completed in the Orion studio. Nino Zucchelli was active especially after the war. In love with Bergamo and deeply tied to its peculiarities and traditions, even though he was born in Clusone, he has always worked to make it known in the world.
Son of Bortolo and Maddalena Fiorina, following the separation of his parents he moved with his mother and a brother to Casnigo. Then in Bergamo where he was part of the Confederation of Fascist Trade Unions of Professionals and Artists of the province. Graduated accountant, he enrolled in Economics and Commerce at Bocconi in Milan and then left his studies. He founded the Della Rotonda publishing house which operated in the artistic-cultural field and, between 1941 and 1960, he published 94 books. In addition to art he dealt with cinema. From 1958 to 1994 he directed the Bergamo magazine. He then created the International Exhibition of Author’s Film which until 1970 took place in Bergamo and then in Sanremo. He traveled extensively in Eastern Europe and the East, becoming a discoverer of new films and directors to be proposed later in Western Europe. He died, after a long illness, on June 24, 1994 at the Ospedali Riuniti in Bergamo. It rests in the monumental cemetery of Orobie. Six years ago, and also on November 17, 2005, a plaque was placed on the outside of the house where he lived. Iorio’s docu-film represents an opportunity to get to know a man who has promoted culture in every way and who is perhaps not conveniently remembered in the rest of Italy today, except in Bergamo and its province.