Noir in Festival unveils its titles and guests. Two film competitions, the traditional literary and film awards, presentations of the latest book titles, plus comics and podcasts, with a pre-opening event on December 1st
The 34th annual Noir in Festival kicks off with a pre-opening event on Sunday, December 1st, at the Rizzoli Galleria bookshop, devoted to broadcast journalist Maurizio Mannoni’s “mystery writer” debut, Quella notte a Saxa Rubra (La nave di Teseo). “The choice of this event,” says Marina Fabbri, “may well be an ideal manifesto for our annual investigation into the genre: a famous journalist, a novel that hunts for truths, a scenario that involves television and the new media, and a plot that is perfect for a TV series, or even a film along the lines of that political cinema that has always paired up with mysteries and noir.”
Promoted by the Ministry of Culture’s General Directorate for Cinema and Audiovisual and co-organized with IULM University under the aegis of the Municipality of Milan; made possible thanks to the support of public and private partners such as the Cineteca Italiana, the Casa del Manzoni, Cinecittà, the Libreria Rizzoli, and La Milanesiana, created and directed by Elisabetta Sgarbi, the festival sets off in multiple directions: film, literature, TV series, comics, and new media, involving all its prime venues in Milan.
As is the custom, festivals are measured by their numbers, to start, and Noir opts for a formula that audiences can easily “size up”: 10 films in the official selection, 8 of which in the running for the Black Panther Award; 5 special events, including the invaluable restored version, courtesy of the Cineteca Italiana, of a little-known classic such as Macadam, the last film directed by Jacques Feyder, in 1946; 5 Italian titles holding their world premieres at Noir, such as Dedalus by Gianluca Manzetti; our opening and closing titles and two special events; 10 countries as producers of the films on the official selection and 5 first films; lastly, 6 titles shortlisted for the Claudio Caligari Award.
On the literary front, the lineup of events at the Rizzoli Galleria bookshop features seven authors, among whom, eagerly-awaited, Maurizio De Giovanni, with his new novel Volver out in just a few days, published by Einaudi; the remarkable debut of Carlo Calabrò, Meccanica di un addio, published by Marsilio; the star of Spanish crime novels, Juan Gómez-Jurado (writer of the popular Prime series, Red Queen). As well as the authors at Rizzoli, Noir’s literary lights include the “big five” finalists for the Giorgio Scerbanenco Award for Best Italian Noir of the Year and the winner of the Readers’ Prize (in collaboration with the city of Lignano Sabbiadoro), appearing on our opening day at the Casa del Manzoni, on December 2nd.
This year’s winner of the Raymond Chandler Award needs no introduction: the famed American writer Joyce Carol Oates. She will be handed the award on the evening of December 5th, at Teatro Franco Parenti (arranged jointly with La Milanesiana) and will take the stage, on the following day, at IULM University, first for a conversation with Antonio Monda about Oates’ latest novel, Butcher, published in Italy by La nave di Teseo, and on the next day, Oates will be received by IULM president Valentina Garavaglia and then take part in a talk with Fabio Vittorini and Anna Re.
Headliners of our 2024 edition include: the rapper Salmo; the members of the film jury, James Jones, Chiara Caselli, Fulvio Risuleo, and Letizia Toni; Maurizio Mannoni; Félix Kysyl, star of Miséricorde by Alain Guiraudie; Gustav Moller (director of Sons); Jianjie Lin (director of Brief History of a Family): as well as Asia Argento, Carlo Calabrò, Joyce Carol Oates, Maurizio De Giovanni, Fabrizio Ferracane, Matilde Gioli, Juan Gomez-Jurado, Antonio Monda, Daniele Orazi, Roberto Proia, Violetta Rocks, Gabriella Simoni, Pablo Trincia, and Vanna Vinci.
A novelty this year comes in the form of two talks devoted to podcasts and the popularity of audio with video reports; a new section reserved for comics and master graphic artists, starting with Paolo Bacilieri, who takes on Scerbanenco’s own Milan; and Noir’s partnering with Trieste’s ShorTS Festival on the contest Shorts-Noir Comics Marathon.
“We like to think,” Giorgio Gosetti observes, “that the upcoming edition of the festival is a territory to be explored, as exciting and entertaining as it was for us to get it ready for you, with superb films like Steven Soderbergh’s horror genre debut, the heart-pumping Zero, or an English-style black comedy like Fatti vedere, along with auteur series like Gangs of Milano, new entries in Italian mystery novels, and eminences like our Chandler Award winner. Quite the cocktail to sip in a city already decked out for Christmas, but with unsettling memories interspersed, courtesy of Giorgio Scerbenanco’s inimitable prose, and Milan by night captured by Vanna Vinci’s original brushwork for our poster this year.”
