ATLAS presented in the Panorama Suisse section at the 74th Locarno Film Festival

It will be the film Atlas by Ticino director Niccolò Castelli,  filmed in Ticino and supported by the Ticino Film Commission, to open the program of the independent section of the Locarno Film Festival Panorama Suisse, whose films are selected by representatives of the Solothurn Days, SWISS FILMS and the Swiss Film Academy. The event is for Thursday 5 August 2021 at 11 am in the Sala FEVI, in the presence of the director and some members of the cast and crew.

The film, a Swiss-Italian-Belgian co-production largely shot in Ticino in the city of Lugano and its surroundings, was the opening film of the 56th Giornate di Soletta and also received two nominations for Best Film and Best Cinematography (Pietro Zuercher). Recently, it was presented at the 67th Taormina Film Festival where the protagonist Matilda de Angelis received the award for Best Actress. Atlas is currently in Italian cinemas distributed by Vision distribution and will be distributed in Switzerland next autumn by Outside the Box.

Synopsis 

Allegra is a lively young woman with a passion for high mountain climbing. She decides to travel to Morocco to reach the top of the Atlas, but her trip ends ab- ruptly when a man explodes a bomb in a coffee shop and her three friends die in the attack. Unable to overcome the trauma months later she returns to her city, where the encounter with Arad, young refugee from the Middle East, forces her to confront her perception of reality, her fears and heal her profound interior wounds.

Director's notes 

The need to write "Atlas" came about 10 years ago, at a very particular, decisive moment. Just like the current pandemic, which touches many aspects of our lives, I had the feeling then that something was creeping into our daily lives without leaving us: fear. Like many of my generation, I had the feeling that I was living on a neutral island, free and happy, sheltered from the rest of the world, but all of a sudden we realised that we could not leave it all behind. We are part of this world.

The protagonist of my film, Allegra, savours full freedom before the dramatic event that will change her life. She believes she has a bright future ahead of her, ready to seize it. When she comes face to face with realitỳ - hard, naked and raw as the rock of our mountains - the effect is devastating. "Atlas" is an attempt to understand how it is possible to overcome our fears by meeting and opening up to the different. In order to feel truly free, as on a mountaintop in contact with the sky, perhaps we need to open up to the other. At a time when everyone yearns for freedom, "Atlas" tells of a great effort to achieve it.

In the cast: Matilda De Angelis (Allegra), Helmi Dridi (Arad), Irene Casagrande (Giulia), Nicola Perot (Benni), Anna Manuelli (Sonia), Kevin Blaser (Sandro), Angelo Bison (Fulvio), Anna Ferruzzo (Margherita), Neri Marcorè (Ludovico), Doro Müggler (Physiotherapist), Cristina Zamboni (Ladina), Andrea Zogg (Benni's father).

Atlas is produced by Imagofilm Lugano (Villi Hermann and Michela Pini) in co-production with Radiotelevisione svizzera (RSI) and is an international co-production between Switzerland, Italy (tempesta Roma) and Belgium (Climax Films Bruxelles).

Info and reservation

Watch the official trailer: