Venice 80, Paolo Jannacci and the film about his father Enzo: “He makes you rediscover his humility”

2023-09-08 13:46:17

“It is the testimony of an important moment, dad would be proud. He would say ‘but I don’t deserve to be here with all of you’. It is the teaching of humility, which we artists should all have.” These are the words with which Enzo Jannacci’s son, Paolo, comments on ‘Vengo anch’io’, the film directed by Giorgio Verdelli about his father, produced by Indigo Film and presented this morning in the Out of Competition section as part of the 80th Venice Film Festival Venice cinema. “It is a film that I hope will become dear to all those who see it and who will be able to know, discover or rediscover facets of dad that were lost”, adds his son Paolo.

Ten years after the death of Enzo Jannacci, the film describes the talent, eclecticism and originality of the Milanese artist. Not a simple biography, but an introduction to his world in an original way, obtaining an intimate and poetic portrait of an artist who navigated between many different genres, because he himself was a “genre”, and in which archive footage is alternating with interviews with personalities from the contemporary Italian musical world. “He was a free hitter. He didn’t allow himself to be regimented, he wasn’t part of the tour company – explains director Verdelli – he said heavy things in a light way, and then he had the rare ability to invent ways of saying and to describe a situation in three words”.

The director explains how he worked on the film. “I was a bit of a detective, I went hunting for things,” says Verdelli who develops the documentary through testimonies and interviews of friends and artists close to Jannacci. “The affection that Jannacci enjoys from the artists moved me,” he reveals. Underlining that “there is a haughty attitude from some colleagues who by making documentaries don’t make things successful, but for me it’s not right. The balance between moments of success and things that no one knows about is what makes a great documentary.”

“Those who do my job have the great privilege of leaving products that in some way belong to them and that survive them. Unlike fiction, in cases like this the products remain with the additional function of leaving something that can be remembered, the memory of someone who had a huge influence on the future, as in the case of Jannacci”, explains the producer Nicola Giuliano. “What I feel very much in this historical moment is the lack of memory, and therefore leaving this documentary gives total meaning to my work, beyond the commercial aspect”.

“We are happy and proud to have the opportunity to show it to the public in a cinema”, echoes Giampaolo Letta. “Jannacci is a character who has marked the cultural, musical and social life not only of Milan but of Italy, perhaps too little appreciated for what he meant”. The film will be distributed in Italian cinemas “in 200 copies, which could increase after today’s screening. We have excellent exit polls from Milanese cinemas”, explains Letta.