The italians and the army between wars and peace. A historical account, and especially the human that springs from the pages of the diaries of four soldiers in more than 150 years from the unification of Italy up to our days, to the tune of popular songs that have stood the time. Words, music and images from the archive that make up the Mess with the jacks documentary, Gianfranco Pannone and Ambrogio Sparagna that continues and concludes the journey between culture, memory, and social life began with the previous Let it be the saints . After the preview at Giornate degli Autori at the latest Venice film festival, the film produced and distributed by Istituto Luce-Cinecittà comes to the cinema from January 16, load of prizes and awards (best documentary film at the Italian Film Festival of Madrid special jury prize Cict-Unesco, Siae prize to the creative talent, career award at Pannone by the festival Visions from the World-Images from the Reality of Milan. And also in the fifteen finalist as best documentary at the David di Donatello). The two authors will accompany the release of the film on a tour that will stop in 25 cities, with discussions and small music events with Sparagna and his barrel.
” Mess with the jacks testifies to the difficult relationship, suffered and also ironic of the Italian people with the military and with the power,” says Pannone, “a history of violence and pain, but also a song for peace, a cry against all the wars that’s so important for me and for Ambrogio Sparagna, the protagonist, and leitmotiv is a soldier of today, Vincenzo Marasco , that he has participated in several peace missions”. The words of the documentary are those of the diaries, starting with that of a soldier lombardo of the Royal Army stationed at Pontelandolfo, Campania, where he was among the protagonists of the massacre of civilians more bloody in the aftermath of the unification of Italy. Then it was the turn of a driver of viterbo, of the Royal Army, who in 1935 went to fight in Ethiopia, convinced of the primacy of fascism and that, instead, he discovered the reality of the gas to the detriment of the local population.
