Sea, music and cinema.
Nature meets art and talent, producing a fresh, colourful, fascinating language of communication.
The constant search for new ways to express beauty has led San Marzano to explore the expressive and stylistic means of cinema, supporting a cultural project that speaks of the sea through music.
“Porto Rubino – Storie, canzoni e lupi di mare” (Rubino Harbour – Stories, songs and sea wolves) is a docufilm based on an idea of Taranto singer Renzo Rubino. The protagonist is the sea, a precious and fragile resource, victim of the invasion of a modern monster: plastic.
Directed by Fabrizio Fichera, the documentary retraces Renzo’s journey to discover places and artists who sing about the sea and want to convey a sense of respect and protection.
It is scorching in July, sailing from Polignano to Taranto, rounding the Salento finis terrae. And the artist’s small fishing boat, Tramari, becomes a theatre for meetings and music. Renzo, the captain, meets the singer Diodato, “warrior of the Ionian Sea” who, as a Taranto native, knows a thing or two about fighting for the environment: Noemi, Paola Turci, Gino Castaldo, Bugo, Giuliano Sangiorgi and Vasco Brondi.
Moving through the waters, in search of the “monster”, we come across forgotten worlds and places, unusual characters, former smugglers and seamen who warn us: “The sea must be respected’… almost a sentence, because the northwesterly wind is unforgiving, even on this occasion.
Finally, we reach the Tramari landing stage, in a sea… of vineyards. Those of San Marzano, at SAMIA, in the Maruggio (TA) countryside, where the small fishing boat becomes a stage, stepped on by other artists: Ron, Morgan, Bobo Rondelli, the Selton, and even Brondi and Noemi. Singing about the sea, a party among friends; a meeting of voices and passions.
Premiered at the 15th Rome Film Festival on 13th October, the docufilm “Porto Rubino” will be broadcast by Sky Arte (Sky channels 120 and 400) on Wednesday 28th October at 21:15, and will be available on-demand and via streaming on Now TV.
The spotlight is not on wine, but on an invisible thread that links this sea voyage to common values and traditions; to the link between man and his natural environment. A universal idiom, without intermediaries and barriers, of culture and courage, which speaks to the heart.
San Marzano is still experimenting with the language of film. From February 2020, “The Pursuit of Beauty”, another documentary entirely produced by San Marzano Vini on another journey in Vietnam, can still be viewed on the company’s YouTube channel www.youtube.com/sanmarzanowines.
The journey returns as a leitmotif, as a quest and a path for those who are driven by the desire to discover, see, investigate, even if this involves obstacles and risks. And what happens is crucial for learning to sail even when the sea is rough: “a boat is safer when it is in a harbour; however, that is not why boats are built”.