MILAN. A very rich program that of the Mix Festival, with 50 titles in competition, 36 previews of the best international lgbtq + cinema, and still numerous meetings, guests and special events including the “More Love” award to Mina Welby, the guests of honor Luciana Littizzetto and Arisa, respectively awarded the title of “Queen of Comedy” and “Queen of Music”.
There is a desire to meet and be together in this 36th edition marked by the theme of the restart, as suggested by this year’s slogan “Back to love”. After two years marked by the pandemic, Mix Festival is back in the proven hybrid formula, online on the Nexo + platform, and in presence at the Piccolo Teatro Strehler (with DJ sets in the churchyard), and in two new meeting places in the heart of the city, the Casa degli Artisti and the Garibaldi multimedia aggregation center. Lots of music with live shows and rooms in full capacity: from the homage to Pasolini to the live performances of Le Endrigo, Vale Lp and Mydrama.
Festival directors: from new normal al new different
“Back to love” does not mean an “uncritical” return to normality: “The socio-political situation we live today – explain the three directors Paolo Armelli, Andrea Ferrari and Debora Guma, in the Manifesto of this edition – points to the birth of a renewed New Queer Cinema“, Which provides for a transition from the” new normal “, a new post-pandemic and hopefully post-war normality” which, however, does not question the increasingly active dynamics of heteropatriarchal power “, to a radically opposite” new different “, That is” an intersectional path in tune with what B. Ruby Rich summarized in the title of his very interesting latest article After the New Queer Cinema: Intersectionality vs. Fascism).
«More love» award to Mina Welby
The “More Love” award fits into this context, which will be awarded on Saturday 18 June on the stage of the Piccolo Teatro Strehler to Mina Welby, wife of Piergiorgio and co-president of the Luca Coscioni Association, “for years on the field to defend the rights of who suffers and the freedom of choice on the end of life “.
Mina Welby
Awards to Littizzetto “to smile again” and Arisa “queen of music”
Among the other guests of the MiX, Luciana Littizzetto who during the opening night of Thursday 16 June at the Piccolo Teatro Strehler will be awarded the title of “Queen of Comedy”, “because we want to smile again but also to look at the world with attention, intelligence and care, as only she knows how to do “declare the three directors. The appointment is at 8 pm with the conduct of Marianna Aprile and the participation of the comedian Matteo Fallica.
Sunday 19 June (8.45 pm) will instead go up on the stage of the Strehler Arisa to receive the title of “Queen of Music”, as part of the closing evening, which will open with the live performance of the revelation band of the last X-Factor Le Endrigo, authors of this year’s MiX theme song, and will be hosted by Edoardo Zaggia and Alberto Sacco of Le Rubrichette, the comedy show that has conquered Instagram and YouTube.
Live performances by Vale Lp and Mydrama
Numerous leading artists of the Italian scene perform live, such as Vale Lp and Mydrama, both launched by X-Factor (Saturday 18 June, 8 pm, Casa degli Artisti); the acrobat dancer Marco Cristoferi, aka Kira, successfully passed to Italia’s Got Talent and recently on the prestigious international stage of theEurovision Song Contestwhich will open the festival, and Italy Bares – a charity show, now in its third edition this year, in support of the Association Anlaids for research and awareness raising on AIDS and HIV – which after the success of “Rewind”, a show staged last May 12 with over 90 artists on the stage of the Repower Theater in Milan, will be present at the Strehler with some performers for a performance during the final evening of the Festival.
Mydrama
Broadwaythe protagonist cinema
But the true protagonist of the festival remains the great cinema, since the opening night when on the screen of the Piccolo Teatro Strehler will be projected Broadway, feature film debut by Greek Christos Massalas, which passed successfully at the 50th International Film Festival in Rotterdam; an unusual noir set in a sort of squat nestled in an abandoned theater complex in an Athens worn out by the economic crisis, within which the destinies of Nelly, Markos, Rudolph, Mohammad, The Locksmith and Jonas, a gang of pickpockets that make up the little world of Broadway.
Feature films, shorts and docs: here are the most anticipated titles
The central core of the program are the three international competitions dedicated to feature films, short films and documentaries, which include for the most part Italian premieres, passed in the main international festivals and from all over the world, such as Poland, Kazakhstan, Israel, Argentina, Iceland. , Egypt, Lebanon, Rwanda, Chile, Brazil, Greece.
Among the most anticipated titles, the Italian previews of Framing Agnes by Chase Joynt, a documentary winner of the Next Innovator Award and Next Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival; Cut! by the Spanish Marc Ferrer, a queer thriller that pays homage to Italian genre cinema and in particular to Dario Argento, with a singing homage to Daria Nicolodi inside; the intense All Our Fears by Lukasz Ronduda and Lukasz Gutt, the Polish film winner of the last Polish Film Festival, which tackles the problem between religion and homosexuality in a strongly Catholic and homophobic country; Shall I Compare You to a Summer’s Day?, an experimental hybrid between theater and fiction by Egyptian director Mohammad Shawky Hassan, presented in world premiere in the Forum section of the latest Berlinale; and Nico by the German Eline Gehring, a work against stereotypes.
Special events out of competition
Still great cinema for the two special events out of competition: on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the birth of an undisputed protagonist of Italian and international culture of the twentieth century, the poet, filmmaker, intellectual Pierpaolo Pasolini, the festival pays tribute to him – Saturday 18 June, at 16, CAM Garibaldi – with the projection of Pierpaolo Pasolini and the reason for a dream, documentary film made by her friend, colleague and inspiring muse Laura Betti, presented out of competition at the Venice Film Festival in 2001 and then mostly forgotten in Italian cinemas, an editing film dedicated to her figure and her poetry, with passages of interviews, film sequences and unpublished material, which will be introduced by Giovanni Dall’Orto and Matteo Marelli.
This year also the Sky Documentaries Award
The novelty of this 36th edition is the Sky Documentaries Award for the best work competing in the documentary section, thanks to the collaboration with the media partner Sky who will broadcast the chosen title on its channel. The award will be announced together with the winning feature film of the Screenplay Award (Saturday 18 June, 7.40 pm, Piccolo Teatro Strehler) as part of the evening conducted by Pierpaolo Astolfi and Ivana Vamp, drag queen among the contestants of the first edition of Drag Race Italia. During the evening there will be a moment dedicated to the broadcast that has become a global phenomenon, with the intervention of the showrunner Dimitri Cocciuti.
Aid to LGBTQ + people affected by the war in Ukraine
Part of the proceeds from the festival, organized by the Mix Milano social promotion association, will finance the fundraising launched by All Out, KyivPride e Insight to send emergency aid to LGBTQ + people affected by the war in Ukraine. The initiative of the «Suspended Card», a solidarity practice launched in 2020 that allows you to buy a card and leave another to those in difficulty, remains confirmed for this edition.