{"id":507,"date":"2020-06-18T15:24:29","date_gmt":"2020-06-18T13:24:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/web.unibas.it\/life2020\/?page_id=507"},"modified":"2021-01-17T14:44:49","modified_gmt":"2021-01-17T13:44:49","slug":"peretti-abstract","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/web.unibas.it\/life\/peretti-abstract\/","title":{"rendered":"LiFE 2020 Conference – Abstract"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Luca Peretti
<\/strong>The Ohio State University (USA)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ch4 Lucania<\/em><\/strong>. ENI in Basilicata, Landscape and Industrial Labor<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ch4 Lucania<\/em> (Giuseppe Ferrara, 1963) is one of the several films sponsored by the Italian public oil and gas company ENI at the time of the economic boom. The company was involved in a series of large-scale projects in different areas of the country. In Basilicata, it invested heavily in the extraction of natural gas (in Val Basento), and more recently of crude oil in the Val D\u2019Agri. The film, directed by Communist director Giuseppe Ferrara, alternates anthropological preoccupations, naturalistic observations, while exalting industrial labor and ENI\u2019s project in the south of Italy. 
In my paper, I will briefly present Ch4 Lucania<\/em> as part of two larger filmic projects of the time: the anthropological films set in the south of Italy, directed by \u2013 among others \u2013 Cecilia Mangini and Vittorio De Seta, and influenced by Ernesto De Martino\u2019s work; and industrial cinema, particularly ENI\u2019s filmic production, as Ferrara\u2019s film replicates the formulaic structure typical of many of the films the company sponsored in the south of Italy and abroad during the 1960s. 
In the second part, I will provide an ecocritical reading of the film showing how its naturalistic passages, which include long tracking shots in the empty landscape, are interwoven with industrial labor: before the rise of a truly environmental consciousness, the goal of the film is to demonstrate how the extraction of natural gas could coexist with the respect of the natural landscape. Furthermore, the film also aims to demonstrate how traditional habits and customs will be made obsolete by the modernity brought by ENI \u2013 \u201cscience and technology will win superstition\u201d, as the film makes explicit. While this is a largely fraught narrative, it shows how several sectors of the Italian society of the time, from Communist directors to large public corporations, were involved in this project. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


Luca Peretti<\/strong> is a Visiting Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University. He researches and teaches Italian media, film history, non-fiction cinema, Jewish Italian culture, and Italian cultural history. He co-edited a volume on terrorism and cinema (in Italian) and one on Pier Pasolini Pasolini (Bloomsbury Academics). His work has appeared in, among others,\u00a0Senses of Cinema, The Italianist: Film Issue, Journal of Italian Cinema and Media Studies, Historical Materialism, Comunicazioni Sociali, Quest. Issues in Contemporary Jewish History<\/em>. He is on the editorial board of\u00a0Zapruder World\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0Cinema e Storia.<\/em>\u00a0In the past, he held a position as video-archivist and researcher for the Italian Museum of the Shoah and worked as an organizer of film festivals. He also maintains an active role as journalist, collaborating with newspapers and magazines.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Luca PerettiThe Ohio State University (USA) Ch4 Lucania. ENI in Basilicata, Landscape and Industrial Labor Ch4 Lucania (Giuseppe Ferrara, 1963) is one of the several films sponsored by the Italian public oil and gas company ENI at the time of the economic boom. The company was involved in a series of large-scale projects in different areas … <\/p>\n

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