IL PROIEZIONISTA

Two friends, after finishing their work shift, go to a friend who manages a cinema to watch a movie. They are, however, unaware that the cinema manager is a ruthless serial killer interested in rather macabre screenings. "The Projectionist" is a short film (just under eight minutes) directed by Roberto Loiacono (director of the controversial feature film "Zone 3"), a work that, based on the premises and the suggestive classic-style title, would undoubtedly have made one hope for something good. The potential for a good product was indeed all there: a serial killer who prefers beautiful girls, who acts in a seedy cinema and adopts a rather bizarre but original torture method (it's really innovative to see projectors mounted on the cadavers instead of the head); in short, the material was good and substantial and, if elaborated further, would have been sufficient even for the production of a feature film. Unfortunately, however, all those good ideas that at first glance could have seemed undoubtedly appetizing, at the time of transcription on paper and realization have completely faded so that the final result is quite disappointing. The biggest and most evident flaw of the film lies in the screenplay, which is a simple disaster and seems to be doing its best to ruin a good subject. The plot, on paper, is extremely poorly assembled, the sequences follow badly and without any logic, to the point of making the viewer think that: either during the final editing the editor was in effect post-hangover; or, before starting the reshoots, the pages of the screenplay were accidentally mixed and no one noticed. Furthermore, despite the few minutes of duration, there are far too many screenplay holes capable of making the whole thing even more amateurish. Loiacono, in the direction, does not make any effort to try to solve, even partially, the script problems and the acting of the two leading actresses is highly poor. In short, "The Projectionist" could have been a good project but, alas, it ended up definitively in the wrong hands. A truly wasted opportunity!