Grandi speranze

Maintaining the light-hearted approach of I PROMESSI SPOSI (2007), Massimo D’Anolfi and Martina Parenti’s GRANDI SPERANZE offers a triptych portrait of entrepreneurs leading Italy into the future by looking to the East. Each ambitious and distinct in personality, they display various levels of determination and competency to realise their ventures. First, the film follows Antonio Ambrosetti, the founder of an entrepreneurship programme. In addition to guiding his students through quotes by Dante and Seneca, he plans a trip to China to develop a “multinational perspective”. Then there’s Federcio Morgantini, a hopeful young man who moved to Shanghai to revolutionise the beverage industry, intent on introducing sparkling water of European quality to the luxury Chinese market. Gazing out from a skyscraper, he sees millions of potential customers and exclaims, “Hang on, China! It’ll be me who quenches your thirst!” Finally, we meet Matteo Storchi, a short-tempered industrialist aspiring to thrive in China who can’t seem to communicate orders to his colleagues. If the 21st century is the Chinese century, GRANDI SPERANZE captures the beginning of this transition, chronicling the efforts of visionaries who were perhaps ahead of their time. (Winnie Wang)

In the presence of Massimo D’Anolfi & Martina Parenti.

Massimo D’Anolfi, Martina Parenti (selection): I PROMESSI SPOSI (2007), GRANDI SPERANZE (2009), IL CASTELLO (2011), MATERIA OSCURA (2013), L’INFINITA FABBRICA DEL DUOMO (2015), SPIRA MIRABILIS (2016), BLU (2018, K), GUERRA E PACE (2020), UNA GIORNATA NELL’ARCHIVIO DI PIERO BOTTONI (2022, K), BESTIARI, ERBARI, LAPIDARI (2024)