Emanuele Crialese
- Writer
- Director
- Producer
Although born in Rome in 1965, Emanuele Crialese has Sicilian roots, to
which he pays tribute in film after film. In 1991 he leaves for the USA
where he studies film direction at New York University. After making
several shorts, he directs his first feature-length movie
Once We Were Strangers (1997),
in New York. The year was 1997, the film was in English and was awarded
several prizes, among which the Valenciennes International Film
Festival Award. He then decided to return to his homeland and met
international success (both in festivals and art houses) with his first
Italian work Respiro (2002), shot on
Lampedusa Island in Sicily in 2002, with
Vincenzo Amato and
Valeria Golino in her most ambitious part
to-date. In 2006, his next film
Golden Door (2006), once again with
Vincenzo Amato but without Valeria Golino
(Charlotte Gainsbourg was better
suited to play an English-speaking emigrant), examined the question of
emigration to the States at the beginning of the 20th century, more
particularly from the perspective of poor Sicilian peasants.
