The Festival, which takes place every year at the end of July in Breuil-Cervinia and is organised by the Aosta Valley Region, the Valtournenche Local Authority and the Promocinema Cultural Association, sees the exclusive participation of the films which received awards in the world's most important Festivals of Mountain and Adventure. It is therefore a Festival of Festivals, hosted under the fabulous and imposing Mount Cervino, the only Festival in the world to show to the public award-winning films and, therefore, to really ensure not only a higher quality of the works in competition, resulting from a previous selection, but also a truly global outlook, which encompasses countries as far apart as the United States, Slovakia, France, Canada to name but a few.

The films in competition, all in original version with simultaneous translation into Italian, show, in turn, extremely varied social contexts, which embrace, for example, the current situation of the ex-URSS climbers, the problems faced by the Tibetan people during the Chinese domination, the most recent sport achievements and the documentaries directed by Folco Quilici on various peaks in the world, the cartoons focusing on the protection of the environment or the films on the War Resistance in the mountains. Within the event, there is a category which hosts, apart from documentaries, full-length feature films such as Himalaya, which has had an enormous success in the cinemas all over Italy and A time for drunken horses, winner of the Camera d'or at Cannes, to name but a few.

The films in competition are judged by an International Jury which, in the last editions, was formed by high-profile personalities such as Alberto Barbera, Director of the Mostra del Cinema in Venice, Mario Brenta, director of Barnabo delle montagne and follower of Ermanno Olmi's (another famous Italian filmmaker) school, Franco Prono, teacher of History of Cinema at DAMS, Turin, and Chairman of the Cinema Museum Association, Michael Dillon, Australian director, who made six films about Sir Edmund Hillary (the first climber to reach the Everest), Aldo Audisio, Director of the National Mountain Museum in Turin, with which our Festival cooperates since its first edition, Fulvio Mariani, Swiss alpinist and director, cameraman for Cry of Stone by Werner Herzog and The Wooden Man, a portrait of Mauro Corona, climber and sculptor, who told us the Vajont tragedy, Kurt Diemberger, Austrian writer and the only living alpinist who can claim to have been the first to climb twice peaks higher than 8,000 meters, and many other names not less prestigious.

Every year, also, our Rules require the presence of the Director of one International Festival. Many and prestigious the special events, starting with the cooperation, which begun in 2000, with the National Cinema Museum of Turin.

The Cervino Filmfestival will finance every year the restoration of an old print kept by the Museum and such an initiative has already seen the restoration, last year, of Maciste Alpino, silent film dated 1916, part of the historical an cultural heritage of the world cinema. As recently remembered in a meeting at the Modern Art Gallery of Turin, organised by the National Cinema Museum to introduce the current initiatives of historical print restoration, "Maciste Alpino" was screened in world premiere last year in Cervinia, town which shares such an honour with others like Paris, London and Venice. Another completed restoration, shown last year for the first time, is The Prodigal Son, made in 1936 by the famous director Luis Trenker. Further, last year saw the creation of the International Alliance for Mountain Film, comprising the National Mountain Museum and 12 of the most important Mountain and Adventure Film Festivals in the world, with the aim of promoting and revaluing mountain cinematography, together with a serious commitment towards the restoration of the precious historical heritage of many film libraries which still "hide" footage of exceptional interest.

The Cervino International Filmfestival represents finally an important and familiar yearly appointment for those who love this type of cinema, with prominent guests such as Stefano Della Casa, Director of the Turin Young Cinema Filmfestival, Catherine Destivelle, courageous and beautiful climber, Tomaz Humar, nominated by Reinhold Messner as his successor, Walter Bonatti, Riccardo Cassin and many, many other important people. Despite the "young" age of the Festival, its functions of crossroad of the best mountain film productions and of forum to reflect on the issues relating to the mountain such as the understanding and the respect for nature, are praised by many.

ORGANIZERS
Aosta Valley Regional Authority
Commune of Valtournenche
PROMOCINEMA Cultural Association

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