Six secretaries (Cesarina Marchetti, Paola Quagliero, Liliana Avincola, Anna Maria Scafasci, Resi Bruletti and Fiammetta Profili) delve into the past to tell us what it was like to work in the world of Italian cinema when our films used to clean up at award ceremonies, from Venice to Los Angeles, via Cannes. The documentary is a revealing flash­back of their lives, both off and on-set, enriched by anecdotes, revelations, unpublished photographs and other curiosities related to some of the great classics. Years later, the protagonists of the documentary still have the same passion and determination in their eyes as when they started out on their adventures into the world of cinema, a world where the word ‘impossible’ doesn’t exist.
In an era when everyone wants to be seen, to construct glossy social profiles and to celebrate every little work success as a heroic undertaking, we want to tell the stories of women who built their own careers (“but would you call it a career?” asks Paola, secretary to Franco Cristaldi) remaining in the shadows, in the offices (“a wonderful place”, says Cesarina, sec­retary to Goffredo Lombardo), without ever demanding to be in the front row.
Through their voices and memories, we wanted to reconstruct what it meant for these women to work alongside powerful and enlightened men, lovers of great cinema, producers, directors and managers who made Italian cinema history, a cinema which today remains famous the world over.
They did not stand by their sides in private, as wives or partners, but they assisted them in the daily battles of those busy and lively offices where the careers of directors, screenwriters, actors and actresses would be determined. Our protagonists dedicated their lives to cinema, but few are aware of this. In our documentary, we wanted to acknowledge and remember them.

Raffaele Rago and Daniela Masciale