Less than two weeks after the Taormina Film Festival wrapped its 72nd edition, the Sicilian fest’s Artistic Director Tiziana Rocca is gearing up for her next event on another picturesque Italian island. Filming Sardegna Italy, which Rocca founded nine years ago, kicks off June 25-28 at Forte Village in Cagliari, Sardinia, and is set to screen more than 50 films, which include a mix of Italian and world premieres. The guest list includes the likes of Harvey Keitel, Sofia Carlson, Tim Roth, James Franco and more.
The four-day festival officially opens tomorrow with Toy Story 5 before wrapping on Sunday with a screening of Warner Bros. upcoming title Supergirl. (This year, the festival started screening a special section of films for students, who make up a large portion of attendees, in Cagliari from June 18).
While it’s a rare feat for a festival head to be launching two international events back-to-back, Rocca history with both festivals runs deep and she maintains that she’s able to balance the two because of their different focuses.
Taormina, she says, is “more historic and grander” and has a long history of prestige while Filming in Sardegna, which Rocca founded nine years ago, is rooted in mentorship and education, with a strong focus on championing female voices and new generations of filmmakers.
“They are very different festivals with very different focuses,” Rocca tells Deadline. “Last year, I reintroduced the international competition at Taormina and this year, my focus for the festival was to build a top jury. I needed a serious jury that was able to receive movies from all over the world as that is why Taormina is so popular. We have the famous Ancient Greek Amphitheatre that seats more than 6,000 people and it’s very complicated for that reason. We have to feed a different and much bigger audience.”
Oscar-winning director Jane Campion presided over Taormina’s jury this year and a host of starry guests were in attendance including Russell Crowe, whose recent project Bear Country world premiered at the festival, Helen Mirren, Clive Owen, Emile Hirsch, Holly Hunter, Miles Teller, Scott Eastwood, Abbie Cornish, Akinola Davies Jr. and Connie Nielsen among others. Italian stars included Giancarlo Giannini (Casino Royale), who was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award, as well as Franco Nero and Michele Placido, who were feted with awards.
She continues: “Filming in Sardegna is completely different because we have many more movies, but the student aspect is incredibly important to us. It’s more conversational and we aim to bring audiences and students from the Academy Cinema, the beating heart of our event, face-to-face with top talents from around the world. They see films every day – probably a minimum of three a day – and that conversation is key. We also bring in young students from different schools all over Sardina and give them a chance to see world cinema. We do it for the cultural reason.”
Rocca’s has a long history with Taormina. The Italian festivals specialist and producer previously headed up that festival for five years before being forced to step down in 2017 amid political turmoil. Subsequently the Sicilian event endured a turbulent few years with the pandemic and also a revolving door of artistic directors who attempted to step in and revamp the festival. Former Venice head Marco Mueller had a brief stint in 2024 before Rocca was brought back aboard last year.
Last year, she reintroduced the international competition, which had been absent in recent editions, as a way to shine a spotlight on the importance of global stories. The five-day event, which took place June 10-14, saw Turkish film Hear the Yellow, from director Banu Sıvacı, win best film, director, actor and actress.
Rocca says the sheer size and history surrounding Taormina means that is a “more stressful” event to put together whereas Filming in Sardegna is “more relaxed,” even though the latter has more movies screening across a shorter period.
For Sardegna, Rocca says she is aiming to position it as a place to launch summer films in Italy, and Toy Story 5 and Supergirl are reflective of that (Toy Story 5 released in Italy June 18 while Supergirl begins its international rollout today). “I try to launch the season of summer and all the international movies and Italian movies that are set to go out in the summer.”
Further films in the lineup include: romantic comedy Between Love and Deception, directed by Kat Coiro; the action thriller Misdirection, directed by Kevin Lewis; The Mummy by Lee Cronin; Craig Brewer’s Song Sung Blue: A Melody of Love; Hamnet, co-written and directed by Chloé Zhao; Mortal Kombat II, directed by Simon McQuoid; The Murder on the 3rd Floor, directed by Rémi Bezançon; Baz Luhrmann’s Epic: Elvis Presley in Concert; The Life List, directed by Adam Brooks; Super Mario Galaxy: The Movie; Franco-Belgian comedy C’était mieux demain, directed by Vinciane Millereau and starring Elsa Zylberstein; Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights; Antoine Fuqua’s Michael and The Bride!, written, directed, and co-produced by Maggie Gyllenhaal. The first episode of Walker: Independence, a Western created by Anna Fricke, will also screen at the festival.
Additional guests at Sardegna this year include French actress Elsa Zylberstein who will head up the shorts jury, Euphoria creator Sam Levinson, Sveva Alviti and Kate Beckinsale. Jeremy Piven and Shadowhunters actress Katherine McNamara will both receive the Filming Italy International Awards.
Sardegna’s short film competition ‘In Corto’, which is organized in partnership with the University of Cagliari, is one of the highlights of the festival, says Rocca. The winning short films will be broadcast on Rai Cinema Channel and the festival’s MyMovies platform and are also presented to American audiences at its sister initiative Filming Italy – Los Angeles, which takes place in February.
“For Sardegna, my hope is simple but ambitious: to make the island an essential summer appointment for the international industry – not a symbolic one, but a real meeting point where cinema and television, distributors and streamers, talent and young students all sit at the same table,” says Rocca. “The festival was born to build a bridge between the industry, formation and territory, and the direction I want to keep pushing is exactly that – more masterclasses, more space for emerging voices through initiatives like In Corto and the Academy, and Sardinia confirmed as a strategic location, not just a beautiful backdrop. Each edition should leave something behind for the next generation of filmmakers.”
She continues: “For Taormina, the ambition is to elevate its international stature while keeping it deeply rooted in its own cultural and historical identity – that ancient theatre is unrepeatable, and the festival has to feel worthy of it. I came back to Taormina with renewed energy after the years away, and what I want for the upcoming editions is continuity and credibility, a festival that the international industry takes seriously, that the territory feels ownership of, and that positions Sicily, alongside Sardina, as one of the indispensable stops of the cinematic summer.”
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