If you have any idea that cinema was born in France at the end of the 19th century by the Lumière brothers, then it’s time to think twice. Mario Mucciarelli, a film auteur, but above all passionate about the Seventh Art since time immemorial, gives us proof that it all began in Bologna, in fact not by chance, home to one of the most important Italian film archives.
He does so with his latest book, Lumière Lumière (Sagoma Editore, 2024, pp. 200), a concentration of stories full of humor and devotion to the cinema of times gone by. Stories that take place in a cinema in Bologna that showed only old films and where the seats were extremely uncomfortable. The projector was making sinister noises. And in the room there was a bustle of nuns, mimes, popcorn sellers, drunks, film buffs and more drunks. It was the old Lumière cinema, the place from which the Cineteca di Bologna later “sprouted”.
We asked Mario Mucciarelli, how did the creation of such a special e-book come about?
«Over the years I have written several humorous stories, but they have remained in the drawer. I wanted to do something with it, before it became a fossil record: humor gets old quickly. I made my partner read them, and she especially enjoyed two stories that were set at the Lumière, the arthouse cinema linked to the Cineteca di Bologna, which I frequented as a boy in the 1980s. The old Lumière, because in the meantime the cinema has changed location. In short, those two had aged well. I wondered if they couldn’t be the nucleus of a collection of stories about those years, about Bologna, about the world of cinephiles. I said yes, I wrote the stories, then Carlo Amatetti from Sagoma Editore also said yes. Then we contacted the Cineteca di Bologna, and anxiously awaited a response. Or rather, I was anxious. Amatetti was calm.”
How many of them are true, autobiographical, and made up?
“It’s all true, except what I invented! No, those are all fictional stories. For example, the film director in these stories does not follow the model of the director of the time or the director of today. Summer exams didn’t start the way I described. And, despite what I’ve written in the book, I’m pretty sure there’s never been erotomaniac cuddles around Light (who knows, let’s say). However, some elements are more than true: the translations of the films into the original language were a truly strange experience. But it was also the only way to watch a Swedish film and get a confused idea of what it was about, that is, apart from death. “
What is your connection with the Cineteca di Bologna?
“Affectionate, fervently grateful, I left Bologna in 2001 and returned a few years ago. I didn’t know anyone in the Cineteca. De fact, I was terrified that director Gian Luca Farinelli would find the book out of place. On the contrary, he enjoyed the operation. “
What does cinema mean to you?
«I have worked and work there, in the world of cinema, but for me cinema is above all the old films that I used to watch at home or in the cinema library. The old Lumière was perhaps the only place where I felt comfortable. I hate going into clothes shops, for example, but I always go to the cinema without any problems. I don’t know, maybe because at the cinema I don’t have to take off my trousers once the curtain is closed. I mean, it’s not mandatory.”
But is cinema still the seventh art or is it now an aging medium?
“He’s old, yes! But there’s nothing aging about him. But more than a decrepit old man, the cinema seems to me like a forty-something in a mid-life crisis, you know, like those who buy a motorcycle. ” , taking random drugs, flirting with waitresses. Since the arts never die, but more often than not remain convalescent indefinitely, I would say this may be a long phase. But that’s okay. As long as there are art and rehearsal theaters.
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