Open Air Premieres- Il cinema all’aperto

An evening of cinema under the sky of the historic center, in the heart of the Santa Spazio Culturale – Former Convent of Santa Chiara in Brindisi, to present two short films that come from different paths but speak the same language: that of identity, the courage to expose oneself, and the opportunity to change through meeting the other.

On Friday, July 4th, at 8:30 PM, “Open Air Premieres – Two Film Previews” will take place, a special event promoted by Scuola Talìa and SMTM, featuring two works: “Altri giorni” (Other Days), with a subject by Maurizio Ciccolella, and “La Migliore” (The Best), a short film conceived by Valeria Galasso, emerging from work with adolescents from the acting school.

At the center of the evening is the artistic and pedagogical journey of Maurizio Ciccolella, director, actor, and educator who has built a permanent workshop in Brindisi that bridges theater and cinema in recent years, transforming actor training into an experience capable of producing works, images, and communities.

A small event dedicated to cinema also through the great music that has narrated and made it unforgettable. To open the evening, while waiting for the darkness to turn on the projector, there will be a DJ set exploring the solemn sounds of grand cinematic fanfares, the lyricism of authors like Morricone and Piovani. A half-hour journey through the collective memory of cinema: not a simple background, but an emotional framework capable of preparing the gaze, igniting the imagination, and transforming the courtyard of Santa Chiara into an open-air theater.

At 9:00 PM, the premiere of “La Migliore” will take place, a choral work entrusted to the adolescents of Scuola Talìa. Here, theater becomes a “mental room,” where the boys are forced to look at themselves without filters. A lively and surprising choral work that brings to the screen the dynamics of a group of teenagers grappling with rivalry, the need for recognition, insecurities, and the desire to be seen. The short film cleverly and delicately captures the adolescent world, reflecting its energy, cruelty, innocence, need for attention, and sudden capacity for empathy.

The film manages to weave together irony and depth, lightness and unease, immediately conveying the adolescent world: the involuntary cruelty, the fear of not being enough, the need to excel, but also the sudden possibility to take a step back and make space for others.

At 9:15 PM, “Altri giorni” will be screened in preview. In just 15 minutes, Ciccolella presents a character marked by fear, memory, desire, and the difficulty of remaining authentic under the gaze of others. His performance focuses on the details: pauses, silences, gazes, the minimum tension of the body, but also moments of vivid emotional expression.

The short tells the story of the encounter between two seemingly opposing worlds: different generations, different languages, different ways of being on stage and in life, and it is precisely from this distance that the possibility of recognizing each other arises. Theater becomes a place of truth, a space where masks fall and the actor is called to show not what they can do, but what they are willing to risk.

The new project addresses strongly contemporary themes: the relationship between identity and representation, the gaze of others, inclusion, the fear of love, and theater as a place where masks fall. Ciccolella, who also co-signs the screenplay with Andrea Di Salvatore, chooses to interrogate the present by drawing on Fassbinder's cinema: how much can age, sexual orientation, social judgment, and even skin color still condition us?

The group that realized this project, led by a very young director, Luciano Appieno, has already planned a subsequent path for national and international festival circulation for this work. After the presentation in Brindisi, the work will indeed enter a phase of evaluation and application to festivals and showcases, aiming to take an intimate and universal story outside the territory, capable of speaking of identity, fear, desire, and scenic truth.

“Every film is born to be shared with the public,” says Maurizio Ciccolella, “and doing it in one’s own city, in a place that has become home to many young artists over the years, makes this premiere all the more significant. It is the starting point of a journey that will continue in festivals around the world, but it begins here, in front of our community.”

The evening will conclude with another musical moment this time dedicated to international rock. Open Air Premieres becomes the meeting point between two paths: on the one hand, the mature experience of an actor like Ciccolella, poised to engage in an intense and personal interpretative challenge; on the other, the energy of young students who bring to the screen a story born from their imagination.

The choice of the Santa Spazio Culturale – Former Convent of Santa Chiara, managed by Yeahjasi, reinforces the initiative's significance: a historic place in the city that opens up to contemporary languages, becoming a space for encounters between cinema, theater, music, education, and community.

Friday, July 4th – 8:30 PM
Santa Spazio Culturale – Former Convent of Santa Chiara, Brindisi
Free admission until seats are filled.
Web: www.scuolatalia.it