The Island

Earthquakes and natural instability "make history" in the life of the communities affected, dismayed, driven back into a semi-wild state and condemned to retrace life stages that have been overcome for several generations until they are reborn in a new balance.

Having escaped from Afghanistan when still a child, Ismail now lives in Europe with his brother Hassan. After several disturbing phone calls, Ismail will have to face the destiny of his family, counting the cost of the senselessness of war and the history of his people, the Hazaras.

The Istituto Luce turned ninety in 2014, its decades-long history intertwined with that of Italy itself, through cinema and that unique treasure trove of images known to all as the Luce Archives. To celebrate its anniversary, some of the most acclaimed rising filmmakers in Italy were invited to make a small film, with each director selecting ten minutes of footage from the archives, out of the thousands of hours of footage to be found there. The result is an album full of different narratives.

Barletta, Italy, 2011: one hundred years after the 1911 Fire at the Triangle factory in New York, several textile workers die because of the collapse of the building in which they used to work as employees of an unauthorized knitwear factory. Mariella Fasanella is the only survivor among the women who worked there. Through her words we experience a century-long journey through the rise and fall of manual labour and industrialism in the Western world.