"Sciatunostro," the breath of Linosa in cinema: the poetry of farewell in Picarella's new film

Arriving on the big screen is “Sciatunostro”, the film by Agrigento director Leandro Picarella, co-produced by RaiCinema with the support of the Sicilian Region. The film, approximately ninety minutes long, will be screened in preview in the city of temples at Cinema Ciak at 8:30 PM on Thursday, March 19, in the presence of the author and the cast. It is a poetic childhood tale between two children on the island of Linosa. A summer story that reflects on time and memory, on memories and the possibility of preserving them. The protagonists are two kids from Linosa, Giovanni Cardamone as Giovannino and Ettore Pesaresi (Ettore). Alongside them are Pino Sorrentino and Teresa Randazzo. After the premiere at the Rome Film Festival, the film “Sciatunostro” will be released in theaters across Italy starting from April 9, with the new distribution PostMov.

The story tells that on a small island in the heart of the Mediterranean, Ettore and Giovannino, two inseparable friends aged eleven and seven, are preparing to live their last summer together. Ettore, forced to move to the mainland in Agrigento to continue his studies, leaves a void on the island that Giovannino must fill. Through the archive and video camera of Pino, an elderly video amateur (Pino Sorrentino, also from Linosa), time becomes shared memory, and the breath of the island – sciatu becomes the breath of an entire community. The Pelagic dialect and particularly the word sciatu – breath – vital breath – is what inspired the writing of the film, whose music is by Leandro Picarella himself.

“Sciatunostro is the story of those who leave and those who stay” – explains director Picarella, 42 years old, in his fourth feature film - of those who face life and those who celebrate it by preserving its memory. It is a film that addresses themes such as the transition from childhood to adolescence, isolation, the experience of separation, and nostalgia. But the true protagonist is time. A time that changes, that regenerates and follows its own dynamics, but also a time that can be preserved inside a two terabyte hard drive. This film – continues Picarella – is born from an essential desire: to give voice and breath to a collective memory that risks fading and to attempt to tell a feeling, that which is felt the first time we experience separation, from someone or something. The island of Linosa, in the Pelagie, is not just a backdrop for this to happen – he concludes – it is a living body, breathing together with its inhabitants. It is land, sea, silence, and wind; it is the gaze of childhood, but also the echo of those who have passed before.