Italy welcomed its first film as if it had been waiting for it forever. The great popular actress – and now director – Paola Cortellesi, 50, says it herself: There is still tomorrow affected in Italian society “a tight rope, a raw nerve”. Since its release in Italy on October 26, the film has been seen by 4.4 million spectators in the Peninsula, more thanOppenheimer, by Christopher Nolan, and Barbie, by Greta Gerwig.
Set in the Rome of 1946 still marked by war, and at the dawn of the birth of a republic where women will have the right to vote, It’s ancora domani is a story of emancipation. In this drama punctuated with moments of humor which will be released in theaters in France on March 13, Paola Cortellesi plays the character of Delia, a poor mother determined to gain her freedom despite the brutal violence of her husband and the more insidious violence of that male domination instills in every corner of society.
The film is also a story of mutual aid between two generations of women, that of Delia and that of her daughter, whom she saves at the last minute from a fate comparable to her own. Filmed in Rome, in black and white, in the Testaccio district, still popular in the post-war period, it is full of references to Italian neorealism, with forays into the field of comedy. “Between the subject and the form, the project did not have enough to reassure producers and distributors… But working on this story was an emergency! “, confides the director.
Paola Cortellesi started as a television comedian in the 2000s. She then distinguished herself by her impersonations of celebrities in prime time programs, then took on roles in successful popular comedies which earned her prestigious awards. About ten years ago, she began practicing her talents as a screenwriter, before preparing for her time behind the camera.
The success ofThere is still tomorrow swelled over an autumn during which its subject resonated with tragic current events. Since mid-November, Italy has been deeply marked by the femicide of a 22-year-old student, Giulia Cecchettin, killed by her ex-partner. The age of the victim and the killer, the middle-class background from which they came, and their profile as ordinary young people quickly attracted media attention. The case took on a whole new dimension when the victim’s sister, Elena, decided to use her mourning as a platform to publicly denounce the structural causes of violence against women.
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