Varo Venturi

Varo Venturi-Clementini (born 9 August 1956, Rome, Italy) is an Italian film director, writer, actor, musician, author, composer and researcher.

Biography

Son of Vasco Venturi and Maria Rosa Clementini (painter / sculptor and classical pianist), in his youth he was attracted by painting, music, philosophy and communication, revealing an ante-litteram multidisciplinary attitude. While studying Anthropology, History of Religions and History of Cinema at the University, he works as a photographer for various weekly and plays as a guitarist and multi-instrumentalist, forming several bands between experimental rock and sound research. Also interested in theater and contemporary poetry, in 1978 he begins an intense collaboration with the Julian Beck's Living Theatre, as a musician and actor, which culminates in the staging of the play "Prometheus", which debuted at the ArgentinaTheatre in Rome. At the same time with some of the members of the New York theater group he develops an experimental super-8 film and attends the protagonists of the beat generation, including Gregory Corso, Allen Ginsberg, William Burroughs, creating a photographic diary of the new American poetry. At the turn of the '80s and '90s, after scoring music for works of contemporary theatre, such as "Medea" by Enrico Job, and painting performances, he begins a prolific activity as a musician, artist and composer, producing and writing for various artists.

In 1983 he meets the singer Nada (Italian singer), for which he writes and composes most of the songs of the album "Smalto" and especially "Amore disperato" (Desperate love), which immediately becomes one of the biggest hits of that year, and then an "evergreen" of the Italian pop music, with a lot of covers in Italy and Europe, as well as becoming, for the repeated use in the recent Italian cinema, one of the songs most exploited as film title track of all times, including the blockbuster "Mio fratello è figlio unico" (My brother is an only child).

As an artist, he creates groups as: N.A.T.O. (along with the singer Gianluigi Di Franco); Richter, Venturi and Murru, with whom he participates in the Sanremo Music Festival (1984 competition) with the song "Mondorama", getting a great critical success; the Mondorhama, with which he makes an album, both in Italian and in English, produced and distributed throughout Europe by RCA and Polydor Germany (a synergy between two majors never happened before).

The single "Stories", extracted from the same album, becomes in Italy one of the hits of summer 1985. In 1987, with the singer Liliana Richter, he forms the band "Guernica", with whom he makes two albums (the second one produced by Vasco Rossi for EMI). In the same year, he forms the band "Blossom Child" for which he writes, together with Paolo Fabiani, and produces the song "I Pray", a European success and a Gold record in France, where it is still a cult in every 80s revival.

Since '93, while achieving some international "dance hits ", in synergy with the Expanded Music, proposing a new vision of the so-called "Italian-disco", he produces the album "Orchestra Spettacolo Mariani" for the singer and rapper Roberto Mariani - that includes "Ex", a rap built on an article written by the journalist Giuliano Zincone (participating together with Giuliano Ferrara and Rome's mayor Giusi Nicolini in the video clip of the song) - and three albums for the singer Francesca Schiavo, for which he also writes the song "Il mondo è qui" (The world is here), which participates in the 44th Sanremo Music Festival.

After he engages in the "filmmaker" career, realizing many pop music videos for various artists, and creates a new musical project that produces an album (today still unpublished), in 1997 he officially begins his work as an author and a filmmaker, under construction since ever. He directs and produces the short film "Cosmos Hotel" - made in the newborn support dvcam - awarded in the "Sacher Film Festival" and hosted at the 1997 Locarno Film Festival and Turin Film Festival. The work, hailed as one of the best short films of the year, brings out, through a personal style, the new "digital cinema" of which Varo Venturi can be considered one of the pioneers.

Later, after scoring his second short film, the controversial "Don Giovanni" (in competition at the 1998 "Sacher Film Festival" ), he participates as actor and composer in Franco Bernini's film, Sotto la luna (Under the Moon), and as actor in Peter del Monte's film Controvento (Against the Wind) performing along with Valeria Golino. At the same time, he co-writes with his collaborator Maria Luisa Fusconi (former student of Alessandro Baricco's Holden school), as well as various projects, the screenplay for the film "L'italiano" (The Italian, directed by E. De Dominicis), in which he is also one of the main actors.

2000/2013

In 2003 he undertakes the adventure of "Nazareno" - his first feature film, independently produced with Maria Luisa Fusconi, and distributed by his newborn Deusfilm - where he directs a multicolored cast of actors, mostly non-professionals, taken from the streets and from life. Released in 2007, the movie gets interesting results in theaters as well as excellent critical feedbacks and various awards, winning in Paris, the Special Jury Award at the European Festival of Independent Cinema (ÉCU 2008),^[1] and a nomination for Best Debut Film at the 2008 Golden Ciak.

Between 2009 and 2011, he begins the adventure of "6 giorni sulla terra" (aka "6 Days on Earth") in which, with the scientific support of Corrado Malanga, Professor of Chemistry at the University of Pisa, he faces the controversial subject of alien abductions, his passionate object of study and analysis since ever, linking it to the many mysteries threatening humanity, from mythology to today's "hidden government".

The film participates successfully in the 33rd Moscow International Film Festival (MIFF 2011),^[2] becoming immediately a "cult", but it suffers a mysterious, heavy "sabotage" as any movie ever in the history of cinema, confirming the uncomfortable, burning contents.

Currently, in addition to the imminent international launch of the English-spoken version of the film, titled "Day 6",^[3] Varo Venturi is developing several new projects including a co-production for a film set in the fifteenth century - where among the various characters the figure of Pope Pius II will be treated, original name Enea Silvio Piccolomini (an illustrious ancestor of his family) - and a sci-fi feature set in the present days in which he will treat the most advanced theses about human cloning and intra-terrestrial alien powers. In addition, the making of "Realscienza" (Sci-real), a series of documentaries in which, along with Italian and foreign researchers, he digs into the secrets of knowledge, in the name of an amplification of the perception of reality, a commitment that he promulgates also writing articles and giving lectures throughout Italy.

Filmography

• 2013 - Realscienza (Documentary) in post-production.
• 2012 - Day 6 (director, screenwriter, actor, editing, etc.) – feature film soon to be internationally released.
• 2011 - 6 giorni sulla Terra (6 Days on Earth) - feature film

Selected at the 33° Moscow International Film Festival 2011 - Awarded for Best Director at the 2012 CinemAvola Film Festival.

• 2007 - Nazareno – feature film (director, screenwriter, actor, cinematographer, editing)

Special Jury Award at ÉCU 2008, European Independent Film Festival in Paris. Special Jury Award at Messina Film Festival 2008. Best First Feature Nomination at the 2008 Ciak D'oro for Italian Cinema.

• 2002 - L'italiano – feature by E. De Dominicis (screenwriter, actor)
• 2000 - Controvento – feature by Peter Del Monte (actor)
• 1999 - Sotto la luna –feature by Franco Bernini (actor, composer)
• 1998 - Don Giovanni – short film (director, screenwriter, actor, cinematographer, editing, etc.)
• 1997 - Cosmos Hotel – short film (director, screenwriter, actor, cinematographer, composer)

Gold Sacher at the 1997 Sacher Film Festival - Torino Film Festival - Locarno International Film Festival.

Discography

           Top Hit of the year
           Evergreen of the Italian Pop Music
           Cover: B-SIde, Caparezza, Mondo Marcio
           International version - Katzenaugen in Germany
           Theme song of "Mio fratello è figlio unico", Vacanze di Natale, ecc.

         Component of the group with Liliana Richter and Marcello Murru
         Sanremo Music Festival 1984 - Giovani Category

          Gold disc in France
          Top 50 Songs of 1985 in Europe

References

External links

• IMDb.com
• Official website