Audience awards: the winners are “Monte Corno - Pareva che io fussi in aria” and “Segnali di vita”

Published 06/05/2024

The Rotari Audience Award for best mountaineering film goes to Luca Cococcetta’s “Monte Corno – Pareva che io fussi in aria”. Leandro Picarella’s “Segnali di vita” has instead been assigned the DAO Audience Award for best full-length film.

In addition to the official prizes awarded by the international jury and the fifteen special awards, each year Trento Film Festival also assigns two audience awards. The Festival public has had the chance to vote at the MyTFF area on the website, allocating a number of gentians corresponding with a score going from 1 to 5. The total score has determined the two winners of the 2024 edition.

The Rotari Audience Award for best mountaineering film goes to Monte Corno – Pareva che io fussi in aria by Luca Cococcetta (Italy/2024/72′). The film tells the story of Francesco De Marchi, who on 19 August 1573 climbed the demanding rocky peak of the Corno Grande, in the Gran Sasso range, with a small expedition, achieving an epic feat for his time: reaching the top out of curiosity, climbing what he believed was the tallest mountain in Italy. Narrated with the words of Francesco De Marchi himself, the film recounts the ascent with a detailed reconstruction, using spectacular images of the climb over the limestone of the Corno Grande.
Luca Cococcetta was born in 1982 in Aquila, where he also studied. In 2008 he won the selections for a preparatory course in direction at the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia in Rome and from 2010 he began producing short films and documentaries with his production house Visioni Future.

The DAO Audience Award for the best full-length film has instead been assigned to Segnali di vita di Leandro Picarella (Italy, Switzerland/2023/106′). In Lignan, a small village in the Saint-Barthelemy valley in Valle D’Aosta, an observatory scrutinises the skies every night. Like a belltower or lighthouse, the great telescope marks the pace of time in the small mountain community. In autumn, the astrophysicist Paolo Calcidese moves into the building as the sole custodian and inhabitant to carry out his scientific research and experiment with new technology. However, as the result of a technical accident, he will be obliged to set aside the stars and his solitude to turn his attention to other forms of life not considered until then: human beings.
Leandro Picarella is a Sicilian director and screenwriter. His first feature film, Triokala (2015), obtained numerous acknowledgements in Italy and abroad. He subsequently wrote and directed Epicentro, premiered at Critics’ Week at the 75th Venice International Film Festival. Segnali di vita is his third feature film.