A duel between human and machine: this is the subject of Monolith, a movie by Ivan Silvestrini, with the screenplay of Mauro Uzzeo, presented at the Giffoni Film Festival. The project sees the young Sandra, mother of a two-year- old child, who tries desperately to rescue her son, locked into a modern, indestructible and inaccessible vehicle.
Created from an original subject by the cartoonist Roberto Recchioni, the film takes on the theme of the conflict between man and machine which was, in a way, already analysed in the second feature film by Steven Spielberg, Duel, 1971. In that occasion the contrast was between a motorist, who only wanted to return home after a long journey, and a truck driver.
“We needed a simple idea – explained Uzzeo – with a very low cost. In Monolith there is this idea, a simple story to be put on stage: a super-technological car, an actress and a child.”
The movie, also presented at FrightFest, looks like an American production for it has been made: “A film with American actors, filmed in America” added Uzzeo. A genre that in Italy is pursued, but not in the cinematic industry, where the comedy dominates.
“We have encountered a thousand difficulties in finding a production, a thousand doors closed at our faces, until the Lock & Valentine has believed in this project, together with Bonelli, who first produced the comic and then the film. Finally, also Sky Italia joined the project. All this happened after 4 or 5 years from the first idea.”
Ivan Silvestrini graduated in Film Directing at the experimental center of Cinematography in 2009 with his tenth short film “We had 2- years“, coproduced by Medusa film. In the following years he created some Web Series and, then, he directed “2night” in 2015, presented at the Festival of Cinema in Rome 2016 and released on Valentine’s Day, 2017.
Mauro Uzzeo is an Italian screenwriter active in the comic industry, cinema and television. Starting from the independent publishing (Il Velo di Maya, Il Gioco di Katie, and Wonderland), he reached the mass market writing for John Doe, Orphans and Dylan dog.
Since 2001 he has worked as screenwriter and director for animated short films (Tricky ‘ n ‘ Ducks, The child who turned off the stars), television commercials (Coca-Cola, Vodafone, Acqua Lete) and music videos (Tiromancino, Jovanotti, Subsonica, Planet Funk, Coolio & Snoop Dogg, Bungao & Paola Cortellesi, Mimosa, Hedy Lamarr), obtaining Italian and International fame.
He is a regular of the most important Italian festivals and writes of cinema for Republic-XL and Bestmovie. In 2011 he was included among the five candidates for the David di Donatello award for his work on the digital effects of the film “The last terrestrial”.
He also supervised the direction of the animated theme of the film of Fausto Brizzo “Com’è bello far l’amore“.
In 2014 he writes the screenplay of Monolith, based on the subject of Roberto Recchioni and directed by Ivan Silvestri, which was successfully presented at the 2016 edition of the FrightFest in London.
Thank you Mazda Italia for the Ride!
