Film presentation & Discussion with the film director Dagmawi Yimer

Mo 23. 03. 2015, 19.00, Leokino (Anichstraße 36, Innsbruck)

Va’ Pensiero – Walking stories is an interwoven account of two racist attacks in Milan and Florence and the victims’ painful attempts to piece the fragments of their lives back together. In central Milan, Mohamed Ba, a 50 year old senegalese griot (bard), actor and teacher and resident in Italy for 14 years, is knifed in broad daylight on May 31, 2009. In Florence, residents Mor e Cheikj, also immigrants from Senegal, are beaten on December 31, 2011 whilst working in the San Lorenzo market. This powerful account brings together the overlapping stories of the three protagonists’ ordeal and their enduring hope of building a life in Italy, despite the fear and uncertainty of suddenly being plunged back to the moment of the attacks by one look or gesture. The director Dagmawi Yimer, a refugee from Ethiopia, shows us what violence looks like through the eyes of the victim.

Regie: Dagmawi Yimer
Italien 2013, 56′, italienische Originalfassung mit englischen Untertiteln

mit: Mohamed Ba, Mor Sougou, Cheikh Mbengue; Schnitt: Lizi Gelber; Kamera: Dagmawi Yimer; Musik: Veronica Marchi, Nicola Alesini, Madya Diebaté, Alvaro Lanciai; Executive Producers: Giulio Cederna, Alessandro Triulzi; Associate Producers: Lizi Gelber, Alvaro Lanciai; Produktion: Archivio Memorie Migranti mit Cineteca di Bologna und Premio Mutti-AMM; in Zusammenarbeit mit Fondazione lettera27 und Open Society Foundations.

Eine Veranstaltung in der Reihe In the Belly of Fascism and Colonialism von Annalisa Cannito.
Eine Zusammenarbeit zwischen dem Künstlerhaus Büchsenhausen und dem Italien-Zentrum der Universität Innsbruck.

Dagmawi Yimer ‘Dag’ was born and grew up in Addis Ababa. He left his country after the 2005 post-election unrest in which hundreds of young people were killed and put in jail. After a long journey across the Libyan desert and the Mediterranean, he came ashore on the island of Lampedusa on 30 July 2006. In Rome, after having participated in a video-making workshop in 2007, he co-authored the film Il deserto e il mare (The desert and the sea) along with 5 other migrants. Subsequently he was co-director with Andrea Segre and Riccardo Biadene for the 2008 documentary film Come un uomo sulla terra (Like a man on earth). He shot the documentary C.A.R.A. ITALIA (Dear Italy) in 2009 and Soltanto il mare (Nothing but the sea) in 2011, along with several other short films. In 2011 he coordinated the collective film project Benvenuti in Italia (Welcome to Italy), and directed one of the five episodes. He has been living in Verona for the last couple of years with Chiara and their daughter Ester.

Photos by Daniel Jarosch