#GACFACTORY

Hi everybody, my name is Giuseppe Alberto Chiaradia jr, 25 years old, I WANT TO MAKE FILMS and I’m the author of “The Project” .

The project, for communicative convenience, can be called a cinematic touring talent-show bus I think it is more appropriate to call it a cultural competition, a film agon, a challenge between storytellers or the circus Olympics.

I was born in a small town in Calabria (Italy) overlooking the Ionian Sea 

And it is named Trebisacce. Three brothers and one sister. Many joys and many sufferings.  With the classical culture ambition in the background and a land very often difficult to accept but unashamedly real, I spent my adolescence sneakily reading Bukowski’s novels in math hours, but also in physics and very often in biology, debating about football and feelings, looking for movies on the stalls of Wednesday markets or in the endless  e-mule avenues (in the not too inauspicious hope of not coming across some hardcore movie).

I don’t know exactly when I chose film, I don’t really know if I chose it… I do know that from an early age I felt a certain inclination toward certain arts, first writing and poetry, then drawing, then music, then light and then photography and then drama…

I soon realized that it was not any of them, but all of them, and I found myself figuring out what the path to directing a film might be.

I was 14 years old, I sent a letter to Rai with a script “The Wooden Woman” , I checked for months, every day, the mailbox in our house, no response.

I was a child, I really believed that from that mailbox could appear my invitation to join the studios.

I was very hurt.

But it could not end like that.

Therefore.

At the end of the fun-filled high school days, I literally attached a pillow to a box full of “sopressata” and sun-dried tomatoes, with a string, so that I would have my other arm free for the big suitcase. I took a bus from the fictitious Sibari station ,famous for the platforms that had become swamps because of all the tears of mothers and fathers passing on emigration for generations, and left for Rome Caput mundi, I was 19 years old.

I studied filmmaking, during those years I worked on the sets of other students being an assistant director, sound engineer, organizer or whatever, as long as I received in return assistance in making my short films as a director. In fact, the arrangements were that if, for example, I came to be a sound engineer on your set then you would come to be a sound engineer on my set or an assistant director or a set designer….

With this methodology, many friends and some pitiful acts of persuasion towards uncharitable actors, I managed to make two short films: “Timeless” the first and “All-in, any faith” the second.

Rough, like children crawling awkwardly watching the aduktis legs moving with agility.Somebody can sai they are garbage, i don’t know that, I can only say that after the first “Rolling” screamed on my set, I clearly saw my thoughts taking shape, shaping themselves slowly in the time between an “action ” and a “stop” , and the shocking thing, which I realized later, at the editing, after a week, was that this was exactly what was happening. 

I didn’t have to use words anymore, to tell what was in my head I “just” hai to make films.

This bohemian-tinged Roman idyll was abruptly interrupted by covid-19, which, in a sort of way opened to me  the doors of the working world. 

The combination of a series of tax breaks coming to the rescue of the film production world, deeply affected by the aforementioned pandemic, and the fear of the many “over” (veterans of Italian film sets) of being infected, meant that in the summer of 2020 there were many films in production and few workers.

July 25, 2020, after sending a myriad of e-mails to as many production companies as I could find, I received  a reply from Andrea D* C*****, assistant director of “Alfredino, una storia italiana” who informed me they liked my resume and wanted to meet me to see if I could take the internship position in the directing department.

I was at the beach when I got the email, I called him back immediately, the line was not good, I  explained I was out of town at the time, and taking advantage of the historical period,I asked for an online interview. No luck. They wanted me to go to their office.

So I grabbed my towel and slippers, I said goodbye to my friends, and left again, it was only one day, for the interview. I had no more my room in Hippocrates Avenue 3 as soon as the lock-down had broke out I was supposed to sleep at my friend’s, we had a fight around 2 a.m., and I ended up sharing a one-and-a-half bed with my big snack buddy Vincenzo (Me 198cmx92kg, him as much as me) who thankfully sleeps without the silent. It was indescribably hot.

July 26, 2020, interview.

9 a.m. A.M  Lotus production headquarters , Viale Mazzini, Rome.

Lots of chaos in the office, a dozen doors opening in turn, a few giggles when I said I was there for the intern position in the director’s depo. A winking delirium. My legs weren’t shaking, I was where I wanted to be.

I meet the first AD, another Andrea, V******* this time. Two Andrea’s I will probably never forget. The tones were light, I thought we were going to talk about Fellini and Kubrick and the films I wanted to make (later with the two Andreas we hai a speech about it), but instead that time they made sure I was self-appointed and that I was a trustworthy person. 

They evidently saw in the eyes of that Calabrian guy, trying to contain the cadence a little bit, the desire to do something good.

I was in it.

Now I do not want to do the chronicles of all my days on sets, this is not the context, maybe there will be other occasions … however, I must tell you this one. 

Even before arriving on the set, always for “Alfredino” I participated in the preparation (period during the which the set days and all the production needs are organized) and after a few hellish days in August, locked in an office with air conditioning turned off due to popular protest, the days of the first script “readings” with the actors finally arrived.

It was September, we were in De Paolis studios, on Tiburtina , in Rome, I had to pick up the actors at the entrance and take them to a room on the upper floor, near the tailor’s shop, where Marco Pontecorvo, the director of the series, gas.

The main actress in the project was Anna Foglietta, I knewn about that since the beginning. Every time I talked about it with some friends, he thought I was privileged. I don’t think we had the same motivations in mind, but I was. And I’ll tell you why.

The first day I met her, I didn’t see her clearly right away, she was covered by sunglasses and hat, but especially unlike the welcome given to the other actors, for her, everyone was there: the production inspector, the organizer, the assistant director and even some makeup artists engaged in other productions, who wanted to claim a greeting or an exchange of jokes in honor of some previous collaboration.

A fair wall of people surrounded her and separated me from her, I stayed at a distance, I had no right to bypass the others and introduce myself first, it was not my time yet. And So I stayed at a distance, her perfume made her seem much closer than she was, it was a beautiful perfume, it reminded me a little of Kenzo, my mother’s perfume, however, it was not that, it seemed to be a personal fragrance , made just for her and it overpowered everyone: the mystique of september sweats, the smog, the smell of the neighboring McDonald’s and the bad thoughts.

I followed the trail of scent always at a distance, there were so many people I wanted to say “ehi everybody, let her breathe!” . But she was comfortable, she laughed often, even her laughter had a very wide range of sound, like her scent. 

Finally they sat her in the dressing room in front of the mirror, in the makeup chair, and the industrious Virna and Daniela began to buzz around her. 

It looked like she was at the dentist. 

Once the hair and makeup auditions were over, it was my turn to escort her to the rehearsal room.

I wasn’t used to call people older than me “you,” in fact I was a little annoyed by this gratuitous confidence that everyone on the set allowed themselves. So I came out with something like, “What water do you prefer Mrs. Anna?” Whereupon she turned around, and peered trying to figure out if I was the son of some old friend who was making a joke at her, then said “And who are you ?” a bit of the “And who do you belong to” so dear to us Calabrians. “I am Giuseppe, from directing” I didn’t feel like saying I was the intern. It was not a lie. I was paid with a 50 euro voucher for diesel fuel/week (0.5 l of naphtha/1h).  Therefore it was only an omission. On the record I was part of the directing department.

” For ANNA, natural water,” said Motherly.

I was emanating stagism from every pore.

I accompanied her to the reading room, the other cast members were already there, there was Vinicio Marchioni, Francesco Acquaroli, Luca Angeletti … I closed the door and sat there in front.

I had my personal book, at that time it was by Vanni Codeluppi “The Sunset of Reality” , I was preparing an exam, I read 8 pages, while in the room behind me they were starting to rehearse the first lines, on the 8th page, I stopped.

It was Anna’s first attempt to reproduce the screams of the mother of Alfredino, an Italian child who fell into a 60-meter artesian well in the 1980s. 

They were the first attempts, not tamed by the director and not purposely cadenced.

She was screaming, loud, very loud, crying and screaming. She was a mother screaming inside a well in the hope of hearing her son’s voice. I read the script many times, I knew the story and the characters, but 

that afternoon I heard Franca Bizzarri screaming in the fields of Vermicino, hoping that God had granted her a wild card that time. I got to know her and felt her pain, which went beyond even the walls.

I looked at the book, but I was no longer reading.

A tear escaped me.

Then The director said, “It’s interesting but here you are shouting too much… .”

I was angered at first because of this abrupt intervention but then I laughed, because it sounded like an older brother teasing you during Christmas dinner for writing the letter to Santa Claus, and the director was just doing his job.

That day, in the dark of a dusty room at De Paolis Studios, Anna Foglietta, unhinged a door without touching it and made my heart tremble.

Me and Anna Foglietta on the last set-day of “Alfredino una storia italiana”

Three years have passed since that afternoon, in which I had the privilege of working with so many professionals, getting to know so many people, from whom I received so much advice and learned so many things coming to the conclusion that: I DO NOT WANT TO MAKE MY FIRST FILM AT 40 YEARS OLD.

I want to do it now.

The industry sets are unbelievable, what can I say, we are in Italy it is not America, but I am a boy from Calabria who was born where there were no cinemas I could never imagine to arrive one day, in the gears behind the screen, working there, being part of that caravan…I had a role in the circus. Since few months now I have left my job in “industrial” cinema (I gave my first forfeit to a film) to pursue my dream: trying to be a film producer.

The first project I want to devote myself to is “The Project.” 

To explain the content of my idea, it is necessary for me to make a brief distinction between industrial and academic sets.

A lot of work is done on industrial sets, the days last a minimum of 10 hours but often for the “directing friends” they become 11 or 12 or 13… there is a lot of running around, a lot of arguing (then making up) some days are really destructive but in the end one way or another great things are brought out.

On the academic sets on the other hand, you work like 18 hours straight, you ate pizza every day, often margherita, there are no salaries except for a few euros for the most reluctant actors, to make a long story short there isn’t anything. Those sets, however, are imbued with what I think is the secret of any art, sport or generic action to be performed with a group of people: friendship. Those who are there they really want to be there. 

And then all those hours without an organization to stop traffic illegally or sneak into abandoned buildings to have a high-end set design amor free is nothing. And in the end, not always, something beautiful comes out even so.

Since a lot I have been thinking of a way to combine the majesty and efficiency of industrial sets with the friendliness of academic sets.

After long tribulations I came up with “The Project.”

Inside the manifesto you will find everything you want to know about “The Project” . If you do not have time to read it you can choose one of our explanatory videos in 1 min, 3 min or 3-shot formats.

For additional information you will find all our contacts at gacfactory.com .

We will be happy to talk with you and satisfy all your curiosities.

When I ask you to help me raise 50,000 euros to make The Project, I like to think that we are raising them to have five small films made by five groups of friends, who then always with the same group could make a real film.

Making films in friendship, it doesn’t sound bad …

The Project is not my film , The Project is my idea of filmmaking. 

Enjoy THE PROJECT.

                                                            Giuseppe Alberto Chiaradia Jr.

P.S. 

The figure of 50,000 euros is only the amount to be allocated for the production of the short films in the competition and does not cover production costs. 

However, we consider the budgets to be allocated to the production of the selected stories the centre of our project. Because if we reach that, no one can stop us, even if we have to make it with iPhone cameras.