Cinema Paradiso will welcome patrons back, paying tribute to cinematic art and its impact on individuals and community. Former documentary filmmaker Giuseppe Tornatore “has plugged into something vital about the hold movies have on us,” says Rolling Stone. “The film recreates a time when people gathered in shoe-box theaters, like this village's Cinema Paradiso, to watch flickering images that could conjure up the whole world.”
“Its child's-eye view of the world—a view bursting with wonder, curiosity and longing...” remarks the New York Times. “Early in the movie, Alfredo (the projectionist) sternly declares to Salvatore (his young protege): ‘Life isn't like it is in the movies. Life is harder.’ Cinema Paradiso achingly wishes that weren't so.”
And it’s a fitting salute to Ennio Morricone, the composer of this and so many other movie scores (The Good the Bad and the Ugly, and the Oscar-winning The Hateful Eight), who the New York Times memorialized as “a magician of sound” after his July 6 passing.