Le mani invisibili de "Il deserto rosso"

Dall'inchiesta alla sceneggiatura

Abstract

Based on a series of investigations on unpublished documents, this proposal focuses on the case of Il deserto rosso (1964). My research centers on Flavio Nicolini’s preliminary investigations kept at the ‘Michelangelo Antonioni’ Archive in Ferrara. These files are rich in assumptions that shed new light on the genetic process of the screenplay; Nicolini’s investigations put the emphasis on the construction of both the characters and the geographical and socio-cultural context of the !lm. Among the most interesting papers: testimonies of doctors and patients of a psychiatric hospital in Imola; inspections at the ANIC factory in Ravenna, with interviews of workers and engineers. By cross-referencing these archival sources with one of the first typescript versions of the screenplay the aim is to re-read speci!c !lm sequences from a historical-philological point of view. In this way, we will try to trace the ways in which these materials were reworked in the screenplay phase.