Italian Paolo Taviani, co-director of the Palme d’Or “Padre Padrone”, has died at the age of 92

The Taviani brothers, who formed a rare duo in the history of the 7th art, have co-signed a total of around fifteen feature films.

Italian director Paolo Taviani, who with his brother Vittorio made landmark films including the masterpiece Padre padronePalme d’Or at Cannes in 1977, died at the age of 92, the mayor of Rome announced Thursday February 29. “With Paolo Taviani, a great master of Italian cinema is leaving us. With his brother Vittorio (died in 2018 at the age of 88)he has created unforgettable, deep, committed films.”greeted Roberto Gualtieri on X. The secular funeral of Paolo Taviani, who died in Rome following a “brief illness”will be held on Monday in Rome, according to Italian media.

The Taviani brothers, who formed a rare duo in the history of the 7th art, have co-signed a total of around fifteen feature films marked by a very literary style, mixing history, psychoanalysis and poetry. Shock movie, Padre padrone, which can be literally translated as “Father-boss”, is an adaptation of the autobiographical novel by Gavino Ledda. It tells the story of a young shepherd escaping the despotic control of his father. The latter, out of financial necessity, forced him to abandon school, leaving him illiterate until the age of 20.

Strongly inspired by the master of neo-realism Roberto Rosselini, the two brothers were interested in social themes from their beginnings in the 1960s. Inspired by Brecht, Pasolini and Godard, they filmed Under the sign of the Scorpio (1969), their first color film, which will also be their first big success. After the coronation in Cannes of Padre padronethey returned to the Croisette in 1982 with The night of San Lorenzo, a film with a magical atmosphere receiving the Grand Jury Prize. In 2012, with Caesar must die, they performed Shakespeare’s tragedy for the inmates of the Roman prison of Rebibbia. The Taviani brothers then won the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival.