MALFA, Salina -- Actress Maria Grazia Cucinotta will host this year’s Marefestival, running for its thirteenth consecutive year. The event organised by journalists Massimiliano Cavaleri and Patrizia Casale will take place from 14 June to 16 June on the Aeolian island of Salina. 

  This year’s celebration will notably focus on the 30^th anniversary of the film Il Postino, the third most-watched Italian film in the world. Il Postino (1994), released as The Postman in the US, was nominated for 5 Oscars in 1996. The film is widely considered a cinematographic testament to the film’s leading man, Massimo Troisi, who died aged 41 shortly after the end of filming. 

  The island of Salina, along with Procida, which hosted the set of the film, is once again ready to open the summer season with the 13^th year of the Marefestival Salina Premio Troisi – a highly anticipated and prestigious event in the Aeolian archipelago. With three days of cinema, culture, and entertainment planned, the hosts hope to honour the work of the Naples-born actor. 

  The host of this year’s festival, Cucinotta, who also starred in the film, explained how the festival is “an unmissable event in my calendar. Because I continue to travel the world, I realise that Il Postino has remained in people’s hearts, in some countries, they even show it in schools. When you happen to listen to the notes of the soundtrack by Luis Bacalov, bucolic, romantic, deep, love-filled scenes come to mind. Massimo is not dead, he lives on through his work and every year we remember him on the island that he loved so much.” The 2023 festival was instead sponsored by the Ministry of Culture. 

  Over the past 12 years, 82 Troisi prizes have been awarded to big names in cinema: Matt Dillon, Pupi Avati, Sergio Castellitto, Miriam Leone, Edoardo Leo, Giovanni Veronesi, Fausto Brizzi, Roberto Andò, Neri Parenti, Giorgio Pasotti, Massimo Dapporto, Lino Banfi, Giorgio Tirabassi, Anna Galiena, Alessandro Haber, Sabrina Impacciatore, Ricky Tognazzi, Serena Autieri, Lunetta Savino, Valeria Solarino, Simona Izzo, to name a few. 

  The festival was organised by the journalist and artistic director Massimiliano Cavaleri and the head of the organisation Patrizia Casale, alongside Francesco Cappello, Giovanni Pontillo and Nadia La Malfa: “A large number of accommodation facilities are already sold out” the organisers said, “Thanks to the  call of the festival that, each year, in a low season period such as June, welcomes hundreds of spectators, artists, journalists, authorities and institutional representatives through a series of partnerships and promotion of collateral events aimed at enhancing the Sicilian and Aeolian territory through the powerful instrument of cinema.” 

lw