Biographically speaking, I was born in Rome on 22/11/1960 and have always lived in Orvieto. I have a degree in Law but chose not to practice even though I ended up working in a law firm as an employee in 1987. I’ve been writing (fiction) for about 15 years and have been writing screenplays for about three years. However, taking a peek at the subtext: I’m a repressed, inhibited thirty-year-old girl, a fifty-year-old redeemed woman, a sixty-year-old who can finally plan the future in her own image and likeness… rediscovered.
–What inspired you to become a screenwriter?
Like many writers, I had and still have the presumption of “seeing” my stories projected onto a screen: I had to use my ingenuity!
The “gods” ensured that I came across the competition held by the Cineheart Association, “A story for the cinema”, the winner of which would see their dream come true. I didn’t win, of course, but they suggested that I participate in the “Words in images” screenplay course, which was also held by them: it featured a masterful pyrotechnic teacher, Dr Valentina Innocenti, supported by the actress, director, screenwriter and President of the Association, Monica Carpanese.
The rest, involving a host of worries, working all hours, sleepless nights, the sacrifice of Saturdays, Sundays and holidays, came naturally.
“I’ll never forget the afternoon in which I read Laura Calderini’s e-mail, at the start of the film writing course held by Cineheart, in which Monica Carpanese, as President, and I, in the role of teacher, asked the participants to send their respective proposals regarding the scripts they wanted to create. I was disoriented. After years of teaching, I found myself faced with a series of notes which, had I had to employ a rigid teaching methodology, wouldn’t have found even the most vague or generic categorisation. That wasn’t what disoriented me, though. In those lines, which were bizarre and bereft of any dramaturgical logic, full of associations, visions, excesses, provocations, symbolisms and flights of fancy, something rare was hidden, a unique talent, an artistic flash of avant-garde origin.
It was Surrealism: understood not simply as a writing style, whim or authorial virtuosity, but as a genuine, “alternative” way of conceiving reality; so alternative as to break every convention, every certainty, making doubt its principle and, at the same time, the scope of every form of art
Since then, an artistic collaboration commenced between Laura, me and the Association in which everything was put in question, starting from our roles. I couldn’t be the “teacher” and she the “pupil”, rather, she was the artist with a new approach and I was the technician tasked with conveying that disruptive power of visual expression via rules aimed at ensuring its dissemination.
She cried, I trembled, aware of the fact that the danger would be to suffocate the talent through the very technique itself.
That we are here today means that perhaps the exchange was successful and, without doubt, it’s also thanks to the continuous professional support and empathy received from Monica Carpanese and Cineheart.
Valentina Innocenti”
–Do you think the cinema can bring a change in the society?
Any tool capable of conveying messages (cinema is a masterpiece in this regard) through highly widespread visibility can (and should) have strong educational, social and moral power, provided that, obviously, these messages possess sufficient worth.
–What would you change in the world?
The way of looking at reality. In my latest book, I wrote: “For years, I’ve been involved in a divinatory art which, when a sign appears, allows me to observe, understand and process the THINGS in life in a very personal manner. To venture beyond the here and now, look with transparency and cast an eye towards an “alternative” world.
–Where do you see the film industry going in the next 100 years?
