THE SIAE ANDREA PURGATORI LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD: ALICE ROHRWACHER

SIAE, the Italian Society of Authors and Publishers, main partner of the 21st edition of Giornate degli Autori, once again supports and honors the creativity of the Italian film industry by bestowing on Alice Rohrwacher, a filmmaker with an incisive, inimitable vision, its Lifetime Achievement Award, dedicated to Andrea Purgatori since 2023.

In receiving the award, Alice Rohrwacher succeeds to Luca Guadagnino, last year’s winner, as well as filmmakers such as Gianni Amelio and Paolo Sorrentino, earlier recipients of the honor at previous editions of Giornate degli Autori.

Alice Rohrwacher has directed films of international renown, including Corpo Celeste (2011), Happy as Lazzaro (2018), and her most recent, La Chimera (2023). Acclaimed by critics and audiences alike at the world’s major film festivals – such as Cannes, Karlovy Vary, BFI and Tallin – she is a filmmaker who masterfully brings dreams at once personal and universal to the big screen.

Salvatore Nastasi, president of SIAE, has released the following statement about the winner of this year’s award:
“Alice Rohrwacher is undoubtedly the quintessential artist of an Italian brand of magic realism in the present century, a filmmaker who has given voice to an entire generation’s desire to wield chimeras as a means to convey messages that are positive, universal, and incredibly concrete. With this award, we honor a woman filmmaker whose inestimably rare visual poetry is the lifeblood of both audiences today and the cinema of the future.”

Alice Rohrwacher, who will be on the Lido to present her short film Allégorie citadine, co-directed with the French artist JR and premiering out of competition at the Venice Film Festival, greeted the news with this statement:
“My first feature film registered with SIAE, Corpo celeste, marked the start of an amazing adventure, and I thank SIAE and its president for this important award, which encourages me to undertake more journeys of this kind. I also wish to thank Carlo Cresto-Dina and Tempesta, who have always backed me in pursuing my explorations. This is not an easy time for cinema that is independent and free of constraints. Independent film is the immune system of the collective imagination, and as such must be protected. Indeed, I am even prouder to accept the SIAE Award in the name of an independent spirit like the late Andrea Purgatori.”