(Adnkronos) – The 19th edition of the Rome Film Fest, scheduled from October 16 to 27, 2024, will award the Lifetime Achievement Award to Viggo Mortensen and Johnny Depp. The award to Mortensen will be given during the presentation of his new film, ‘The Dead Don’t Hurt’, which he wrote, directed and starred in. The American actor, artist, director and producer will also be the protagonist of a masterclass with the audience of the Fest.
Set in the mid-19th century, ‘The Dead Don’t Hurt’ (Viggo Mortensen’s second film as director and screenwriter after ‘Falling’ – 2020) is a refined feminist western starring Mortensen himself and Vicky Krieps as two immigrants trying to build a life in a corrupt Nevada town. Vivienne, a French-Canadian florist, independent and rebellious, sees her life turned upside down when her partner joins the civil war. Left alone, she must deal with the violent unwanted attentions of the son of a powerful local rancher. With a narrative structure that alternates past and present, between breathtaking landscapes and excellent performances, Mortensen uses the western to give us the passionate portrait of a strong and determined woman.
A lifetime achievement award also goes to Johnny Depp who, on the occasion of the Rome Film Fest, will present to the public ‘Modì’, his second work as a director after his debut in 1997 with ‘The Brave’. The cast of the new film includes Riccardo Scamarcio, Antonia Desplat, Bruno Gouery, Ryan McParland, Stephen Graham, Luisa Ranieri, Al Pacino.
The film is not a biopic, but only 72 hours in the life of Amedeo Modigliani, Modì for the French, who in 1916 is on the run from the police in Paris. The painter wants to leave the city where he has lived for a long time, while his friends Utrillo and Soutine and his muse Beatrice Hastings try to convince him to stay and continue painting. Through a night of hallucinations and meetings, with his art dealer friend and an American collector, his story changes. The project, based on the comedy Modigliani by Dennis McIntyre, was born decades ago, proposed to Al Pacino, postponed, suspended, forgotten, returned with Johnny Depp as director, Pacino among the producers and in the role of the collector, Mary and Jerzy Kromolowski as screenwriter and Riccardo Scamarcio as protagonist.