The short film was created for the second edition of the Film&Parità Project, conceived by Regional Equality Councillor Francesca Torelli. The initiative was launched during the 80th Venice International Film Festival in 2023. While the first edition involved only individuals already working in the field of Equal Opportunities, the subsequent editions aim to engage a broader festival audience. A survey is conducted to assess whether, and to what extent, films contribute to shaping a cultural foundation that helps society deconstruct stereotypes and promote a culture of equality—where people are valued for who they are, rather than for the group they belong to.
The initiative seeks to raise awareness within the film industry about the role cinema can play in advancing Equal Opportunities. It also encourages those starting their filmmaking careers to explore and deepen their understanding of gender equality concepts. This is how the collaboration with the students of the Ca’ Foscari Short Film Festival came to life.
Synopsis: A boy and a girl are competing against each other for who can take the best shots of Venice and its surroundings. Rather than filming, the competition seems to be a duel over who captures the best images, with pushes, jumps, pitfalls and sabotage.
At the end of the day, the two protagonists check the footage side by side only to realise that the individual videos alone are unusable, whereas by overlapping them and thus combining their work, the footage is excellent.
The short film begins in the height of the duel, with the two protagonists scrutinizing each other before grabbing their video cameras for filming. Using the split screen technique to increase the idea of separation, we follow both characters during the action. The split screen at the same time interplays with the two protagonists by creating barriers or removing supports. The whole race is characterised by chases through Venice and short gags until the revealing finale.
Authors: Giulia Bortolatto is studying Economics at Ca' Foscari University in Venice, and she has always been fascinated by cinema, art and theatre. Since 2021, she has been an active participant in the Ca' Foscari Short Film Festival, to cultivate this passion and to contribute to the growth of the activities organised in collaboration with the university. Here she is responsible for both the logistical management and the creation of the event's introductory theme song.
Rebecca Legnaro is a postgraduate student at the University of Padua. She works as a photographer for events and for private clients, she collaborates on video productions for the cultural association Lilium SoundArt and has acted as a figure in the TV series ‘We Are Who We Are’ directed by Luca Guadagnino. Since 2021, she has been a member of the video group of the Ca' Foscari Short Film Festival.
Yulia Kalachikhina is a student at Ca' Foscari University in Venice, MA in Economics and Management of Arts and Cultural Activities (EGArt). She has collaborated on several photo and video productions and her works have been shown in various contemporary art exhibitions. She participated in the artistic residency Le Tracce del Sentiero (Osacca, IT). She is a member of juries at several film festivals (Biennale Cinema, Le Giornate della Luce) and since 2024 she has been collaborating with the Ca' Foscari Short Film Festival.
Eugenio Cavallin has always been fascinated by music. At the age of 5, he began studying musical propaedeutics and at 6, drums. At the age of 11, he entered the Marostica middle school of music with the transverse flute. In high school, he attended the high school of music in Castelfranco, combining the transverse flute with the accordion. He then entered the performing arts techniques course at Ca’ Foscari University in Venice. In 2024, he began collaborating with the video group of the Ca’ Foscari Short Film Festival.
Andrea Cracco is a student at Ca' Foscari University in Venice. He is passionate about art, cinema and literature. He has directed short fiction and documentary films and collaborated on several video productions. Some of his short stories have been published in literary magazines such as Malgrado Le Mosche and La Nuova Verde. In 2021 he joined the video department of the Ca' Foscari Short Film Festival.
Alessio Barbazza. Historian by education, filmmaker by passion. Since 2022, he has collaborated with the video department of the Ca' Foscari Short Film Festival. In 2023, he co-directed his first documentary “Una festa per la città - Venezia 1973”.
Luca Pili is a videomaker with an educational background as an orientalist, who lives and works in Venice. He is one of the coordinators of the Ca’ Foscari Short Film Festival; he is a tutor for the first level master’s degree in fine arts in Filmmaking at Ca’ Foscari University in Venice and for the summer school “Films in Venice and Filming Venice” at VIU Venice International University.
