Luzzu

Maine Film Center | Railroad Square Cinema presents

Cinema EXPLORATIONS:

A COMMUNITY-CURATED FILM SERIES

Sponsored by Colby Center for the Arts and Humanities

Jesmark is a hard-working Maltese fisherman facing an agonizing moral choice. He can repair his leaky luzzu—a colorful, traditional wooden fishing boat—in the hope of eking out a meager living for his wife and newborn son as his father and grandfather did before him or he can find the money to pay for his son’s medical needs. He could decommission his boat in exchange for a payout from the European Union and find something else to do. He has skills valued in a business with people on both sides of the law and facing environmental challenges. LUZZU won a Sundance Jury Prize for its nonprofessional lead actor Jesmark Scicluna—a real-life Maltese fisherman—and heralds the arrival of filmmaker Alex Camilleri working in the neorealist tradition of Luchino Visconti, Roberto Rossellini and the Dardenne brothers, and calls to mind the socially engaged cinema of Ken Loach and the film’s producer Ramin Bahrani (MAN PUSH CART, THE WHITE TIGER). This film has been submitted by Malta for the Best International Feature Film Oscar.