Auber 89
by Giuseppe Schillaci
France, Italy, 2026, 80’, color, b/w
Screenplay: Giuseppe Schillaci, Gabrielle Culand
After an accident leaves actor Fatsah Bouyahmed with memory loss, previously unseen archival footage from Aubervilliers – the housing estate on the outskirts of Paris where he grew up – begins to reconnect him with both his own personal past and the collective memory of his community. Filmed in the 1980s when an ambitious urban renewal project was underway, the images capture a neighborhood striving to improve its living conditions and imagine a better future. As Fatsah revisits the footage forty years later, memories of family, friendship, music, and daily life resurface alongside the social tensions of the time: the growing racism, inequality, and exclusion. Moving between past and present, Auber 89 revisits a fleeting moment of hope before disillusionment reshaped the Parisian suburbs, while the textures of television and VHS ground the story in the sensory world of the 80s. Auber 89 rivisita un fugace momento di speranza prima che la disillusione riconfigurasse la periferia parigina, mentre la grana della televisione e delle videocassette fa da sfondo estetico della storia, radicandola nel mondo sensoriale degli anni Ottanta.
Projections
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10 September alle 21:00 — Sala Laguna
V.O. sub IT
Followed by Q&A
Reservation required on giornatedegliautori.com -
11 September alle 13:00 — Sala Laguna
V.O. sub IT
Free entry, subject to availability
Director
Giuseppe Schillaci published his first novel, L’anno delle ceneri, in 2010, and L’età definitiva in 2015. He’s an editor at Lit-blog Nazione Indiana and contributes to the French literary journals Revue Litteraire and Atelier du Roman, the Canadian Les Ecrits, and the Brazilian Mundo Mundano. As a filmmaker, he directed The Cambodian Room – situazioni con Antoine D’Agata in 2009. The documentary won numerous awards, including the Special Jury Prize at the Torino Film Festival. In 2011, he directed Cosmic Energy Inc.., selected for Hot Docs at Toronto. Two years later, his Apolitics Now – tragicommedia di una campagna elettorale won the Italian Docs Londra Award and the SalinaDocFest Audience Award. In 2022, Schillaci made Il Modernissimo di Bologna,, selected for the Torino Film Festival and winner of Best First Film at PriMed in Marseille. In 2024, his documentary Bosco Grande premiered at Giornate degli Autori, winning Best Film at Salina Doc Fest and Grand Prix de la compétition nationale at Fipadoc in Biarritz. He also holds writing and filmmaking workshops at film schools and the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia.
