Asked about the fact that no Italian director is competing for the Golden palm at this year's Cannes Film Festival and its coincidence with Italy's failure to get to the World Cup for the third straight time, general delegate Thierry Fremaux said it was no big deal and he was sure that Italian films would return to the world's top movie fest.
    "Italy is a great country of cinema, and there will be some small additions...

But let's say that perhaps we haven't seen films that deserved to be in competition.

It's not a big deal.
    It can happen, and the films will return,"Frémaux said on the sidelines of the presentation of the Official Selection of the 79th edition at the Pathé Palace cinema in Paris, responding to ANSA's question about Italy's failure to "qualify" with any film at the Cannes Film Festival, like the Azzurri at the World Cup.
    Frémaux recalled when it was said a few years back that "Italian cinema was dead." And then, he said, Cannes became "the stage for a new generation" of Italian filmmakers, "including Neapolitan ones, with the films of Paolo Sorrentino, Valeria Golino, and a whole young generation of producers like Nicola Giuliano.
    "So, know that you are always welcome in Cannes. And I share your sorrow at not seeing Italy at the World Cup, but I remind you that we (France, ed.) were not there in 1962, 1966, 1970, and 1974.
    "We returned in 1978 and were World Champions twenty years later, in 1998," the Festival director quipped.
   

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