I told you so

Movies
Directed by Director's notes
  • Ginevra Elkann
Year
  • 2024
Length
  • 1h 40'
Directed by
  • Ginevra Elkann
Year
  • 2024
Length
  • 1h 40'
Cast
  • Valeria Bruni Tedeschi
  • Greta Scacchi
  • Alba Rohrwacher
  • Valeria Golino
  • Danny Huston
  • Riccardo Scamarcio
 
  • Andrea Rossi
  • Marisa Borini
  • Sofia Panizzi
Synopsis

It’s a January weekend in Rome when a sudden heat wave arrives disrupting the peace. The sun is pleasant in the beginning, but the heat quickly escalates to a frightening degree. In this surreal climate,people and animals start losing control.
It’s the beginning of a whole new chapter.
The film’s protagonists are all suddenly confronted with the very things they have been artfully avoiding via their ordinary day-to-day ingestions–– be it food, sex, drugs, religion, or excessive romanticism. Now they can no longer escape. They must go through the heat, be transformed by it, each with his own voice and pace.

Director's notes
  • We know the world is getting warmer. But we are so accustomed to our lifestyles, so blinded by what surrounds us, that we cannot change course. We are stuck in a vortex. We know it's all wrong, but we are enslaved by it. We ignore the truth in exchange for temporary happiness. Or at least, that's what I tried to do. During a hot Roman summer, where everything was melting around me, I wondered if the world would be like this forever, forever hot, yellow, and dry. It was then that I felt the need to tell this story. That summer reminded me of the Bible with its natural catastrophes: apocalyptic visions, invasions of locusts, wild animals, and punished sinners. But who were these sinners? Those were the people who interested me: the sinners. I was interested in sin and why today, very often, it is considered an illness.

    "Te l'avevo detto" (I Told You So) is about this. It's a weekend in Rome when a sudden heatwave arrives. The characters in the film confront the difficulties they have skillfully avoided addressing their entire lives, whether it's food, sex, drugs, religion, or plastic surgery. But now they can no longer escape. They are all so focused on their own problems and needs that they don't see the world around them on the verge of collapse. They can only see themselves and not what surrounds them. And this is their tragedy. I chose to set the film in Rome because it is the "Eternal City" and possesses a kind of solemnity and universality that I feel is in tune with the film's themes. This film was written during the pandemic, through endless Zoom calls, in a state of mind certainly influenced by fears that until then were unknown. It was made in a world that was changing, with masks and COVID tests, full of new rules and regulations. "Te l'avevo detto" was a true journey; it comes from places of darkness, places of pain, places of love, and places of hope.
Directed by
  • GINEVRA ELKANN
Un film di
  • GINEVRA ELKANN
Screenplay
  • CHIARA BARZINI
  • ILARIA BERNARDINI
  • GINEVRA ELKANN
Produced by
  • THE APARTMENT
  • RAI CINEMA
Distributed by
  • Fandango Distribuzione
Director's notes
X

We know the world is getting warmer. But we are so accustomed to our lifestyles, so blinded by what surrounds us, that we cannot change course. We are stuck in a vortex. We know it's all wrong, but we are enslaved by it. We ignore the truth in exchange for temporary happiness. Or at least, that's what I tried to do. During a hot Roman summer, where everything was melting around me, I wondered if the world would be like this forever, forever hot, yellow, and dry. It was then that I felt the need to tell this story. That summer reminded me of the Bible with its natural catastrophes: apocalyptic visions, invasions of locusts, wild animals, and punished sinners. But who were these sinners? Those were the people who interested me: the sinners. I was interested in sin and why today, very often, it is considered an illness.

"Te l'avevo detto" (I Told You So) is about this. It's a weekend in Rome when a sudden heatwave arrives. The characters in the film confront the difficulties they have skillfully avoided addressing their entire lives, whether it's food, sex, drugs, religion, or plastic surgery. But now they can no longer escape. They are all so focused on their own problems and needs that they don't see the world around them on the verge of collapse. They can only see themselves and not what surrounds them. And this is their tragedy. I chose to set the film in Rome because it is the "Eternal City" and possesses a kind of solemnity and universality that I feel is in tune with the film's themes. This film was written during the pandemic, through endless Zoom calls, in a state of mind certainly influenced by fears that until then were unknown. It was made in a world that was changing, with masks and COVID tests, full of new rules and regulations. "Te l'avevo detto" was a true journey; it comes from places of darkness, places of pain, places of love, and places of hope.