ORevery journey leads to the discovery of something new. Anyone who has left, even for one timethe places of home to another place – be it near or far – has experienced this feeling. It did too Paolo Cognetti, a Milanese writer who loves the mountains, going away on a journey in which he retraced the footsteps of the greats of overseas literature. The docu-film was born Dreams of the great north that Rai 2 is broadcasting tonight on the first tv at 21.25.
From cinema to tv
Previewed at the Trento Film Festival 2021an important international festival of cinema and mountain cultures, Dreams of the great north, was directed by Dario Acocella. Produced by Samarcanda Film with Feltrinelli Real Cinema and Rai Cinema, and the support of the Valle d’Aosta Region and MIBACT, in the three days in which he moved to the cinema, from 7 to 9 June a year ago, collected 103 thousand euros.
Dreams of the great northa physical and metaphorical journey
The docu-film by Paolo Cognetti it is not just the story of an overseas tripbut the narration of an experience that has become a journey into the soul for a writer who has always been committed to the search for a peaceful and complementary coexistence with the environment. On his itinerary Cognetti was accompanied by his illustrator friend Nicola Magrin who, in addition to being the author of the cover of The eight mountains, did the same with the works of Primo Levi for Einaudi, of Tiziano Terzano for Tea and also of the Nuages edition of The call of the forest by Jack London.
The path of Paolo Cognetti
The Great North told by the docu-film it started in Vancouver, British Columbia, where the writer came from Milan. From there he and Magrin made their way to Alaska in an RV. The tale of nature flowing along the sides of the roads and in the places of arrival it is interspersed with dialogues that represent the journey into the soul of Cognetti.
Paolo Cognetti in a scene from “Dreams of the great north”. (Samarkand Film)
The stages
The physical stages of the itinerary include the Klondike told in the pages of Jack London’s books. The Ocean View Cemetery in Port Angeles, Washington where Raymond Carver is buried. The lakes of Michigan as told by Hemingway. The woods of Massachusetts narrated by Thoreau in Walden or Life in the Woods and also Chris McCandless’s iconic Magic Bus Into The Wild, until recently still parked in Denali National Park, Alaska. To accompany the images there are also the words, in voice-over, by the same authors.
Who is Paolo Cognetti
Born in 1978, Paolo Cognetti is an atypical Milanese. Graduated from the School of Cinema in Milan, public Handbook for successful girlshis first book, in 2004. In 2014, with Fishing in the deepest poolsis already inspired by the stories of the authors whose traces he will trace in Dreams of the great north. His favorite places are New York, which she frequents so much that she dedicates two guides to her. And the mountain that in 2013 tells from her point of view The wild boy. Success comes, however, in 2017 with the Strega Prize for The eight mountainshis first novel set between the Aosta Valley and Nepal, which has been published in 20 countries.
iO Donna © REPRODUCTION RESERVED