Silvio Berlusconi is accustomed to allegations about his sex life being excitedly received abroad. France’s Nouvel Observateur recently published a story titled “Sex, Power and Lies” and the Spanish newspaper El Pais showed photographs of naked guests at the Italian prime minister’s retreat in Sardinia.
Source: The Independent
- Back home, though, the slew of claims over the priapic 72-year-old’s private life usually receive a muted reception, perhaps as a result of his influence over the media. So when the state television channel refused to trail a film that blames Berlusconi for creating a frivolous media culture filled with “half-naked women” and chauvinistic images (he owns three commercial TV channels), the movie’s director interpreted it as straight censorship.
- But the ban by the RAI network on the clip for Videocracy — showing today at the Venice Film Festival — has backfired and led to a surprising uptake in interest in the documentary.
- Videocracy is among the most contentious films to be shown at the two-week event. RAI wrote to the director, Erik Gandini, stating that the film was “offensive” to Berlusconi’s reputation. The advert showed scantily-attired women and statistics claiming Italy lacked press freedom. Berlusconi’s company, Mediaset, also declined to screen the trailer.
- Since then, requests from cinemas in Italy to obtain a print of the film have shot up from 35 to 70 venues, leading to many hundreds more screenings. “The ban indicated the level of tension in Italy regarding everything that goes on TV,” Gandini said. “[Berlusconi] runs three commercial channels in the country. In Italy, what does not exist on TV does not exist. I was scared by the ban, and by RAI’s Orwellian-style letter, but the day after, there was a huge explosion of interest on the internet. The print numbers have doubled.”
- Gandini also made the documentary Gitmo: The New Rules of War, about the American military prison camp at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.
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