Punctuated Identities In Contemporary Italian Cinema

At a time of major political disruption in Italy, this dissertation aims to explore the landscape of contemporary Italian Cinema in connection with the nation’s new demographic trends and social configurations. Focusing on a selected, inherently representative group of filmmakers, the current study proposes a new form of film theory that sees the emergence and recognition of multi-ethnic filmmaking in a hitherto largely monocultural context as an indicator of a profound cultural transformation rather than a mere aesthetic tendency. The critical terminology I propose, “punctuated identitties,” document the characteristics of contemporary filmmakers, since they cannot be easily defined under the categories established by previous critical vocabularies. While these multi-ethnic filmmakers are part of a larger trend in European filmmaking as a whole, and hence constitute a case study of the evolution of a particular trend within individual national cinemas, my aim is to show how their punctuated identities complicate and color the Italian mediascape, and perhaps add a pluralistic dimension to the most recent chapter in the story of one of the most influential national cinemas. The filmmakers analyzed are selected according to specific elements and not on any categorization as first-and-second-generation immigrants. The present analysis includes two immigrants who have consciously chosen Italy as their homeland (Ferzan Özpetek and Jonas Carpignano), a migrant other who rejects nationality (Laura Halilovic), a political exile who relishes a certain sense of freedom in his Italian sojourn (Fariborz Kamkari), and a naturalized son of immigrants (Suranga Katugampala). All move in a fluid and conceptual space that creates a new path inside the traditional domain of national cinema, establishing the validity of others’s points of views and proving that coexistence can enrich even established and influential art forms.