Following La macchina ammazzacattivi (The Machine that Kills Bad People) and India, the Rossellini Project continues on its path with Viaggio in Italia, the initiative created and directed by Istituto Luce Cinecittà, Cineteca di Bologna, CSC – Cineteca Nazionale and Coproduction Office, as a means of rediscovering and show-casing in all its glory the work of a great director, a reference point in the art of cinema: Roberto Rossellini.

Three of Italian cinema’s institutions and an influential international production house have joined forces for a project of total digital restoration of a central and fundamental part of the film-maker’s filmography, and are promoting and distributing it on an international level.

Ten films are involved in the Rossellini Project, and represent the heart and soul of his cinema: Roma città aperta (Rome, Open City), Paisà (Paisan), Germania anno zero (Germany Year Zero), L’amore, Stromboli terra di Dio (Stromboli), La macchina ammazzattivi, Viaggio in Italia (Journey to Italy), La paura (The Fear), India, Intervista a Salvatore Allende. La forza e la ragione (Interview with Salvatore Allende). These are films which did not only mark the birth and consecration of neorealism, but also inspired cinema from different countries and generations, and gave it an autonomy that it did not have before, together with desire and ability to imitate life. These ten extraordinary films have been part of a digital re-mastering project carried out by Cineteca di Bologna at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory, with specific work done on stabilising and cleaning up images and sound.

After the première at Cannes Film Festival, we are proud to present Viaggio in Italia, one of the very few to be worthy of the label ‘fundamental’ for the history of cinema. A film about which another master Jacques Rivette said: “The arrival of Journey to Italy has suddenly made all other films look 10 years older”.