Letta Defines Leadership

TFV speaks with Giampaoloa Letta

Giampaolo Letta is arguably the most powerful man in Italy’s film industry. He hails from an influential Italian family. His father, Gianni, is a wellknown journalist and politician who was undersecretary of state in four Silvio Berlusconi governments. His cousin, Enrico, was himself prime minister of one of Italy’s short-lived governments. Letta became vice president and CEO of Medusa Films in 2004. He produced The Great Beauty, Italy’s last Oscar-winning movie.

The Film Verdict: Thank you for taking the time to sit down with The Film Verdict. We understand that you don’t often grant interviews. So, lets jump in. You personally guided the image and perception of Medusa very carefully over the last years. How do you believe Medusa is perceived outside of Italy today?

Giampaolo: We have always been very active internationally over the many phases of Medusa’s existence. Up until eight or nine years ago, we were very active as buyers. We distributed many films in Italy, from Lord of the Rings to all Woody Allen films, Roman Polanski, and many other important films. Then, we changed our approach a little and started to concentrate more on Italian films. Medusa had always offered Italian films in the international markets, from Giuseppe Tornatore to Bernardo Bertolucci flicks and many others that were coproductions with foreign partners. We coproduced Woody Allen’s To Rome With Love, which was a great success. He had just finished Mid- night in Paris and wanted to shoot a film in Rome, and since we were his long-time partners in Italy, we decided to produce the film together.Another successful example is Paolo Genovese’s Perfect Strangers, which was a

Medusa production that sold in 50 countries and also led to over 30 remakes all over the world. We also produced Welcome to the South - and its sequel, Welcome to the North - which was a remake of the French film Welcome to the Sticks that we had distributed in Italy two years earlier. Last year, we worked hard to get Mario Martone’s Nostalgia on the Academy Awards’ short list. This allowed me to get back in touch with old acquaintances and to travel to many cities like London, Paris, Berlin, New York, Los Angeles, and Denver to promote the film. In my travels, I saw for myself that Medusa enjoys a strong image abroad.And, last but not least, there was Paolo Sorrentino’s The Great Beauty that won the Best Foreign Language Film at the 86th Academy Awards in 2013. I am very proud of what we have done so far.

TFV: As the largest private Italian film company, do you feel a certain responsibility to ‘Italian film’? How do you contribute to it?

Giampaolo::We pay attention to every aspect of it. Traditionally, Medusa invested in box office hits, classical comedies, like the films of the trio of comedians known as Aldo, Giovanni and Giacomo, or commedia all’italiana, like Perfect Strangers We pay attention in particular to new talents, trying to discover them wherever they might be, like Edoardo De Angelis, whose career we launched. Last year, we brought a young director, Francesco Costabile, to Berlin with his first film. He is now working on a new movie, of those who see the streamers pitted against the theatres and the distributors. I think the streamers are our new partners – and very important ones at that. This trend had already started before the pandemic but was accelerated by the lockdown. The streamers can circulate Italian films around the world, and they bring significant resources to us. Now that the pandemic is over, I think we are going toward an equilibrium in the relationship between streamers. added value that stays with the film. In other words, a film that has had success in the theatres does much better when it is streamed on the platforms or on free TV. Then there are those films that can be produced for TV or for the streamers, skipping the theatrical release. In this sense, we have a wider market now, thanks to the streamers

Con Noi. We are paying attention to high quality Italian films of all genres.

TFV: Speaking of quality, over the last years streamers such as Netflix and Amazon have expanded aggressively into international feature films. How has this impacted Italian filmmakers’ mentality as a ‘pay and play’? Has it changed the way Medusa produces and distributes its films?

TFV: Does this have any effect on Italian creativity? Do producers and directors enjoy creative freedom, or do they have to follow the algorithms?

Nostalgia, 95th Academy Awards short listed Giampaolo:: No. During the lockdown, when the movie theatres were closed, we licensed films that had been ready for release directly to the streamers: Prime Video in particular. I think that in general the advent of the streamers has been very positive in that it has opened up and expanded the market in a significant way, not just for feature films but also for TV series. In this way, it has allowed the industry and individual producers to grow significantly. Theatrical distribution is a key part of our activities, but we also work with the streamers. The advent of the platforms has clearly changed both our habits and the face of the market in the past three years, but the results of the Italian theatrical releases in the past six months have been very encouraging. I am not one

A Great Beauty 86th Academy Awards Winner distributors, and movie theatres. For many films, the theatrical release is still very important because it gives the film and the actors greater visibility and an

Giampaolo: I hear a lot of talk about this, but honestly, from my personal experience, when we meet to negotiate, I see that our partners are specifically looking for Italian creativity. Algorithms may suggest a direction or a tar- get audience, but I personally haven’t seen any interference in the creative process. On the contrary, the streamers place great value on our creativity. Besides, streamers look for Italian creativity. For more www.thefilmverdict.com