A funny thing happened on the way to Turin, as the constellation of international guests gathered by the Torino Film Festival to represent world cinema arrived united in its reverence for the local industry above all.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor me, it all began with Italian cinema,\u201d said Daniel Br\u00fchl as he accepted the festival\u2019s Stella della Mole career achievement award at the Torino opening ceremony. \u201cMy father was a director, and when I got my first VHS player at 15, he gave me a list of a hundred films I had to watch \u2014 around 70% of them Italian. Those classics by Lizzani, Fellini, Pasolini and De Sica were the spark. That\u2019s what made me want to become a film actor.\u201d<\/p>\n
More from Variety<\/strong><\/p>\n Fellow honoree Claude Lelouch echoed the sentiment. \u201cI owe a great deal to Italian cinema,\u201d said the \u201cA Man and a Woman\u201d director, who won his Palme d\u2019Or from a jury chaired by Sophia Loren. \u201cAnd when I was very young, after seeing \u2018The Bicycle Thief,\u2019 I said to myself, \u2018That\u2019s what I want to do for a living.\u2019 So in a way, it all started here.\u201d<\/p>\n Indeed, over the course of a glitzy opening gala, guests like Dolph Lundgren, Jacqueline Bisset, Alexander Sokurov and Hanna Schygulla all paid tribute to Italy\u2019s formidable filmmaking legacy \u2014 while the evening\u2019s sole Italian honoree turned to the industry\u2019s more contemporary challenges.<\/p>\n \u201cItalian cinema is in serious crisis,\u201d said actor and filmmaker Sergio Castellitto, who recently turned heads in \u201cConclave.\u201d \u201cBeyond the controversies we all know about<\/a>, even among those not directly involved, my invitation is simple: we have to move past divisions and conflicts. The issue isn\u2019t funding this filmmaker or that \u2014 it\u2019s about saving the industry itself.\u201d<\/p>\n The filmmaker offered a quick diagnosis: \u201cThere\u2019s a widespread lack of skills, experience, professionalism, and talent, which in some cases threatens the entire system. The real effort must be to preserve the industry. Quality and merit remain essential, of course \u2014 but first, we have to make sure we survive.\u201d<\/p>\n Torino artistic director Giulio Base shared Castellitto\u2019s concerns, calling Italy\u2019s film heritage \u201ca source of honor, and a little frustration, because it\u2019s difficult to stand up at the same level.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBut we\u2019re especially proud that directors worldwide \u2014 not just those here tonight \u2014 turn to Italian cinema for inspiration,\u201d he added. \u201cKnowing our films continue to teach and influence fills us with pride.\u201d<\/p>\n Best of Variety<\/strong><\/p>\n Sign up for Variety’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source ca.news.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A funny thing happened on the way to Turin, as the constellation of international guests gathered by the Torino Film Festival to represent world cinema arrived united in its reverence for the local industry above all. \u201cFor me, it all began with Italian cinema,\u201d said Daniel Br\u00fchl as he accepted the festival\u2019s Stella della Mole […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2172839,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25173],"tags":[352121,417769,417768,379154,417770,417767,366168,417766],"class_list":["post-2172838","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artists","tag-daniel-bruhl","tag-de-sica","tag-giulio-base","tag-italian-cinema","tag-jacqueline-bisset","tag-sergio-castellitto","tag-sophia-loren","tag-torino-film-festival"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Italian-Cinema-Takes-Spotlight-With-Honor-and-Urgency-at-Torino.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2172838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2172838"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2172838\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2172840,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2172838\/revisions\/2172840"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2172839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2172838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2172838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2172838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/span><\/div>\n