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World-Class Film Festival Brings Historic Films to Maryland For One Night.

February 08, 2022 School of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures | Cinema and Media Studies | Italian

image of the live film viewing in Bologna Italy piazza maggiore

The first Maryland edition of "Il Cinema Ritrovato on Tour" (Re-discovered Cinema on Tour) will take place on March 18, at the Old Greenbelt Theatre in Greenbelt, MD.

The first Maryland edition of "Il Cinema Ritrovato on Tour" (Re-discovered Cinema on Tour) in the region will take place on March 18, at the Old Greenbelt Theatre in Greenbelt, MD beginning at 5pm.

"Il Cinema Ritrovato on Tour" film festival is a collaboration between the Italian Program and the Program of Cinema and Media studies at the University of Maryland, College Park (UMD), and the Old Greenbelt Theatre, in Greenbelt, MD. The event is produced in partnership with the Arts for All initiative and the School of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at UMD.

Each summer, the Cineteca di Bologna (Bologna Cinematheque), one of the world’s most renowned centers for film restoration—home of the Charlie Chaplin and Pier Paolo Pasolini film archives—presents an eight-day film festival called “Il Cinema Ritrovato.” The festival focuses on restored films, early silent cinema, and director retrospectives. “Il Cinema Ritrovato” has been described as “pure heaven for cinephiles.” Thanks to a collaboration with the Cineteca of Bologna, the Italian Program at UMD will present two of these wonderful films at the Old Greenbelt Theatre, at 5 pm on Friday, March 18, 2022. The festival is co-curated by Luka Arsenjuk (Director of the Program of Cinema and Media Studies), Valeria Federici (Italian Program), Mauro Resmini (Italian Program and the Program of Cinema and Media Studies) and Guy Borlée (Coordinator of the festival for Cineteca di Bologna, Italy).

The 2022 program includes a century-old masterpiece titled Ma l’Amor Mio Non Muore (Love Everlasting, 1913), a century-old silent film masterpiece with music, which features one of the first of the Italian cinema divas, Lyda Borelli, and the recently restored Italian classic, La Notte (The Night, 1962), which was directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, and features Monica Vitti and Marcello Mastroianni. The screening is an homage to Monica Vitti who passed away in February 2022.

All screenings are free and open to the public (link to RSVP coming soon), and will take place at the Old Greenbelt Theatre, located in the Roosevelt Center, 129 Centerway, Greenbelt, MD 20770. 

The program also includes a roundtable in between the two screenings with Joanna Raczynska (Film Programmer at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.), Caitlin McGrath (Executive Director of the Old Greenbelt Theatre), Luka Arsenjuk (Associate Professor of Cinema and Media Studies at UMD), and Mauro Resmini (Assistant Professor of Cinema and Media Studies and Italian at UMD).

About the venue:

Completed in 1938, the Old Greenbelt Theatre is an iconic building in Greenbelt, MD, a federally planned New-Deal-era community. The core of Old Greenbelt was declared a National Historic District in 1997, with the Theatre a prominent reminder of a bygone era of cinema as well as a living institution whose values of community service and collective responsibility remain pertinent and valuable. 

Full program available here