Trip to the Cineteca Lucana

In 2012, our research fellow, Marina Nicoli, made a first exploratory research trip to Oppido Lucano where the Cineteca Lucana is located. Nicoli had the chance to discover the Cineteca’s treasure trove of materials on the Italian film industry: historical documents of ANICA (Associazione Nazionale Industrie Cinematografiche e Affini) from its foundation in 1944 until the 1980s. The ANICA archive is greatly important for anyone studying post-WWII Italian cinema. The Association played an integral industrial role both domestically and abroad. At its peak, ANICA directly represented 90% of the Italian film industry. ANICA was involved in the complex push-and-pull process between the political parties, professional lobbies and its American counterparts. ANICA promoted co-productions to give Italian cinema a more international profile.

In this video, we learn about the scale of Cineteca Lucana and the potential of its research impact. Thanks to Gaetano Martino, Cineteca Lucana is now preserving: reels (feature films and shorts), pre-cinema machinery (magic lantern), movie posters, movie pictures, books and many original archival documents. For the Producer’s Project, the ANICA archive will be fundamental to explore issues such as co-productions policy, the story of IFE (Italian Film Export office) and how the Italian film industry’s identity was shaped abroad.

Marina returned to the Cineteca Lucana in the summer of 2017 with Barbara Corsi to undertake research for the project. The surrounding photos offer a glimpse into this trip.