Venice 1994

VENICE 1994: ERMANNO OLIM'S GENESIS As befits a master filmmaker, Ermanno Olmi is reluctant to give interviews. He lets his films speak for themselves. A shy, self-effacing man, it's always been that way with Olmi. He was especially sparse on words when awarded the Golden Lion at the 1988 Venice festival for The Legend of a Holy Drinker and the Golden Palm at the 1978 Cannes festival for The Tree of Wooden Clogs. And there hasn't been a published interview with Olmi in nearly a decade. One reason for the reticence is the embarrassment of having to answer those all too frequent, nagging "how are you?" and "what have you been doing?" questions. For between the Cannes premieres of The Tree of Wooden Clogs (1978) and Cammina Cammina (1983) lay five years of inactivity, then another four years until Long Live the Lady (Lunga vita à la signora, 1987)...