WILL MILAN BE BACK IN THE CROSSHAIRS OF CINEMA?

From Devil and Holy Water to Creative Couple

MARCH 2024 - GAZE

"Everything in life is useful, life in the end is improvisation.”

Mattia Chicco

In a Milan that tinkles with new stories and distant secrets, we meet two young directors, Michele Rossetti and Mattia Chicco, linked by the symbiosis of their visions. They take us into their world of improvisation, unbridled creativity and the desire to leave an indelible mark on the cinematic landscape.

Although they are not brothers, or twins, as often happens in the world of cinema, Michele and Mattia are partners in crime with a perfect symbiosis. Both, in fact, chose not to follow directing schools, but to be self-taught. And their most demanding teachers have always been the world and life.

Our dream is the same Our dream is the same

We sit at Bar Jamaica and fuss, in the beating heart of Brera, a stone’s throw from the Accademia. If only the walls could talk. Here you can breathe the stories of art like the air: from models to photographers, from Ugo Mulas to Alfa Castaldi. Everyone, passing through Milan, drank a coffee at Jamaica.

Mattia and Michele were born two days and four years apart. They met on set. They both starred as freelance actors for a series that never came out in which they were supposed to play the devil and holy water. “One was a heroin addict who played with a PlayStation turned off, the other was his friend.”

Their shared destinies have crossed again, between work, get-togethers and parties. Milan absorbs you. “We wanted to create something of our own.” So when the pandemic hit, and you couldn’t wander the streets, “We were still shooting.” They were making films. “In China Town in Milan. Deserted. People thought we were journalists. They stayed away from us.”

Today they have a company, which is called Vasta and makes films, and a studio that will soon host events, as well as productions. But their vision is, “vast”, it embraces, includes, engulfs inspirations, craves. It is an itinerant project detached from a physical place. Their main core business, at the moment, is fashion, the creation of fashion films for editorials and fashion clients, such as Etro or Gianvito Rossi.

Michele claims to be a workaholic with a passion for cinema, but being a multifaceted artist he also deals with music, comics and art direction. Having grown up in an art family, creativity is at home. “With legos or pongo as a child I used to create stairs, sets and then I would bring the characters on stage.”

Mattia, on the other hand, is the rock to count on. Michael’s anchor. He is an experimenter. Imagination and improvisation are their signature. “Everything in life is useful, life in the end is improvisation.”

“If I had to describe Michele, who is an incredible person, I would use a metaphor: he is a balloon and I am the weight that keeps him on the ground. It is a machine that must be channeled. It’s hyper stimulating. That’s his quality.” And Michele adds: “The dream is the same. We’re two balloons.”

Working in Milan you realize that fashion, music and cinema influence each other. But Mattia has a wish: “I get very attached to places. Because they are in themselves talking and iconic, but I would love the idea of putting Milan back on the map of cinema, I like purely Milanese stories, even if using it for what it is known for appeals to us. Cinema is in the air, it’s where you make it, in the eye of the beholder, it’s where you see it. When we started, cinema was only Hollywood, and only Rome. Now he’s getting closer.” – The advice for those who want to undertake this work is not to lose tenacity and determination. Finish and send your script, your videos. Sooner or later someone will notice them. – “Just send, finish the script, which ends somewhere.”

If Mattia really likes stories, screenplays, as well as videos, Michele has chosen storytelling in motion because when he thinks of an image he can’t help but think of it without music, without soul: “It’s the only way to try to immortalize memories by becoming part of them, without remaining an external spectator.”

In the dark periods, the two directors have often wondered why they made films, their art, and in their answers there has always been a desire to leave a trace of their passage on earth, a sort of diary, a testimony, and perhaps, even, with a pinch of self-centeredness, of an obelisk.

And speaking of memories and objects that remain or no longer leave a trace, Michele tells me an anecdote, perhaps suggested to him by his own devil disguised as a cupid: “I once stole a black and brown plastic dachshund with soul eyes from a tobacconist. I had never stolen in my entire life. I did it to impress a girl. We took it together. But when we woke up in the morning, it was gone.”

By Alessandra Busacca

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WILL MILAN BE BACK IN THE CROSSHAIRS OF CINEMA?