For Earth Month (April), the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures is offering a film series loosely based on farming and food production. All films are free and open to the public.

For more information, Prof. Colleen Culleton at culleton@buffalo.ed

The fourth film in this month-long series will be Dry (Dir. Paolo Virzi, 2022). Italian with English subtitles.

An imagined three-year drought serves as the point of departure for the latest by Paolo Virzì, a satirical ensemble drama that features a top-notch cast (including Silvio Orlando, Valerio Mastandrea, Monica Bellucci, Tommaso Ragno, Vinicio Marchioni, Claudia Pandolfi, Sara Serraiocco, and others) and a clever way with social critique. Co-written by The Hummingbird director Francesca Archibugi and set in Rome, Dry follows a constellation of self-absorbed characters as the drought and subsequent water shortage take their toll on the city’s populace, exacerbating socioeconomic tensions and perhaps suggesting the imminent end of days. Virzì slyly observes these sometimes likable, sometimes repellent people as their paths cross amid the semi-apocalyptic circumstances, ultimately arriving at a wryly ironic film about the post-Covid world and the vanity of humans in the face of global catastrophe.

(film synopsis from Film at Lincoln Center)

This film series is sponsored by the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, Humanities Institute, Department of Media Study.