Yes, we did win the ‘Silver Fish Award’ at the Vatican’s International Catholic Film Festival in the categories of Best Film, and Best Actor/Actress. This is for the feature length motion picture titled “Duns Scoto” on the life of Bl. John Duns Scotus that the FI’s in Italy produced in conjunction with TVCO. Not bad for our first feature length video. Well done Fr. Alfonso Bruno and team! Deo Gratias!
Here is the English trailer from TVCO:
You can see more on this film Duns Scoto with these AirMaria articles:
Ave Maria! Yes, we are front runners for the ‘Silver Fish Award’ at the Vatican’s International Catholic Film Festival in the categories of Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor/Actress for the feature length motion picture that the FI’s in Italy produced titled “Duns Scoto” on the life of Bl. John Duns Scotus. The other two films that are also finalists, and with which we are competing, are listed below. These finalists were chosen from a total of 746 films. The announcement will be made before the festival ends this Saturday, May 21, probably on Thursday. This is a great opportunity to put a spotlight on Bl. John Duns Scotus, the Franciscan scholar, who gave the theological foundation for the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception, winning the title ‘The Marian Doctor’. It is also a great boost to our worldwide media efforts. Please keep us in your prayers that we win.
FILMS IN COMPETITION
Best Film – Best Director – Best Actor / Actress
Duns Scoto by Fernando Muraca, Italy 2010 – 90 ‘- The story of the medieval philosopher John Duns, also called Scotus because of his nationality (Scotland), who lived between the thirteenth and fourteenth century. The film is produced by the Franciscans of the Immaculate.
God’s MightyServant by Markus O. Rosenmüller, Germany 2010 – 2 x 90 ‘- The story of Sister Pasqualina, and the special role she had in the life of Pius XII, masterfully played by Remo Girone.
Marcelino pan y vino by José Luis Gutierrez, Mexico 2011 – 110 ‘ – Remake of the famous film. The main hero (an orphan in love with Jesus) is played here by a remarkable child actor. The action takes place
The film was Co-produced by TVCO, a multimedia production company based in Naples, Italy, which is also the executive producer and the international distributor of the work.
Our recently completed feature length film on the life of Bl. John Duns Scotus has been selected as the official movie of the upcoming World Youth Day in Madrid Aug 16-21 2011. Our Italian friars just watched the whole film for the first time as an institute on Sunday, Dec 26. Below is a special poster we made for the occasion complete with the Madrid WYD (JMJ) logo. A rough trailer can be seen here. The DVD should be available with English subtitles in early 2011. We will keep you posted.
The translation of the poster is as follows (more…)
The Vatican’s new mobile high-definition broadcast van
Vatican City, Nov 16, 2010 / 07:22 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The Vatican has unveiled a new tool for evangelization in the form of a van equipped with 17 high-definition cameras for live and outdoor broadcasting.
The Holy See’s Vatican Television Center received the state-of-the-art van from Sony on Nov. 16.
Fr. Federico Lombardi, head of the Vatican Press Office, said the new mobile broadcasting unit was a much-needed upgrade. He noted that it has previously taken three smaller trucks to carry the same number of cameras, without the benefit of high-definition technology.
He also noted the increasing use of high-definition video for documentaries and television programs. Thus, the Vatican spokesman explained, a switch to high-definition was “a necessary step” to ensure the Church’s media presence.
Rome Reports covers the soon to be released film Duns Scoto by the Franciscans of the Immaculate in Italy on the life of Bl. John Duns Scotus. He was the Franciscan theologian who gave the Church the theological basis for the Immaculate Conception of Mary which ensured the solemn proclamation of the dogma centuries later. You can see the behind-the-scenes trailer here.
The Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate are producing a feature length dramatic film on the life of Blessed John Duns Scotus, the Franciscan who gave the theological explanation for the Immaculate Conception. The film is called “Duns Scoto”, Italian for Duns Scotus, and is written and directed by Fernando Muraca based on the book by Fr. Stefano Maria Manelli, “Beato Giovanni Duns Scoto” published by the FIs in Italy. Adriano Braidotti plays Blessed John Duns Scotus and is supported by Raffaele Proietti, Sebastiano Colla, Alessandro Chini, Camilla Diana and Emanuele Maria Gamboni in the role of young Duns Scotus along with many others including not a few Franciscans of the Immaculate.
The only thing left to finish on the film is the sound track for which they are currently in negotiations. The film is due to premiere in May 2010 on DVD and in some theaters as was done with the highly successful pro-life film “Bella” and negotiations are underway for putting it on Italian TV and entering it in film festivals. It will be in Italian, but there may be an English version. We will be posting the trailer on AirMaria when it becomes available toward the end of April. So practice your Italian and stay tuned.
On the site of the filming with camera dolly on tracks, microphone boom, and high definition cameras. The high tech equipment makes a sharp contrast with the medieval monastery and period costumes. The director of photography was Massimo Lupi, famous for his creative cinematography in the Italian TV series Il Commissario Rex (Inspector Rex) about the adventures of Rex the police dog.
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The Abbey at Montelabate in Perugia where parts of the movie was filmed. Other locations were a nearby estate and also on the coast near Anconia.
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Adriano Braidotti as John Duns Scotus who is here praying for guidance from Mary as he is about to defend her prerogative of being immaculately conceived. There are two goals of the film. One is to spread knowledge about Duns Scotus in view of his canonization, and then eventually to him being declared a Doctor of of the Church. The other is to help Christianize our important mass media culture that has sadly become so secular and even dehumanized.
Roving Reporter #72 – Eduardo in Connecticut (10min) >>> Play
Ave Maria!
On August 11th Eduardo Verastegui, the lead actor in the award winning pro-life movie Bella, came to the Eastern Connecticut University campus in Willimantic and gave a press conference followed by a talk in front of a packed auditorium. The event was organized by the Sisters of Charity in Baltic, Ct. We captured the press conference and are presenting it in three parts.
Part One:
Eduardo talks about his upcoming movies including one on St Peter with a $160 million budget. Then he discusses his company Metanoia Films and the difficult road of being an independent film producer. He mentions his recently completed world tour for the promotion of the movie Bella. And, finally, about his new non-profit organization Mantle of Guadalupe (Espanol) with which he goes on world missions to give help to the pour and is helping to build a hospital for pregnant mothers in a downtown LA Latino barrio.
Roving Reporter #73 – Eduardo on his film company and the moral struggle in Hollywood (10min) >>> Play
Ave Maria!
In Part 2 of 3 Eduardo answers questions about how he had to start his own film company in order to avoid playing degrading, immoral roles and the difficulties and obstacles on the road to success. He relates his involvement in promoting adoption, then how much actors in Hollywood struggle with immorality but how it is worth the struggle, and finally his status as a role model.
Roving Reporter #74 – Eduardo gives his finale (09min) >>> Play
Ave Maria!
In this third and last part Eduardo discusses how the movie Bella effected so many people, the audience, the actors, the film crew and also many pregnant mothers who changed there minds about aborting their babies. He also covers his views on the need for morality in art, on politics and his hopes to use his films to unite people and even to influence Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, whom he is planning on meeting. God Bless you Eduardo!
The pro-creationist documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, focuses not so much on the refutation of Darwinism, but on the suppression of the academic freedom of anyone who dissents from Darwinism. This is a brilliant coup de main, which uses the weapon of the enemy, and another example of how liberal bias really is not interested in diversity and pluralism at all. The Darwinist’s don’t know what to do when academic freedom is used against their secularist dogmas. This is from Jill Stanek of WorldNetDaily:
On March 20, two Darwinian defenders, who accepted payment to talk like buffoons on the film, tried to bust into a private screening in Minnesota.
“PZ” Myers, a University of Minnesota biology professor and proprietor of the popular atheist blog Pharyngula, was quickly expelled, much as he condones expelling professors who deviate from the monkey line, as he wrote on The Panda’s Thumb blog:
The only appropriate responses [to Intelligent Design proponents] should involve some form of righteous fury, much butt-kicking, and the public firing and humiliation of some teachers, many school board members, and vast numbers of sleazy far-right politicians.” ~ Comment #35130, PZ Myers, June 14, 2005
Richard Dawkins, an evolutionary biologist at Oxford who wrote the book “The God Delusion,” gained entry only by foregoing his evolved surname for the formal, Clinton.
Myers then disrupted an “Expelled” conference call with reporters the next day.
These uncivilized spectacles caused a liberal mass meltdown. According to an “Expelled” press release, the “Expelled” controversy held the No. 1 slot in the blogosphere all day March 24, as registered by Nielson’s BlogPulse, and garnered over 800 Technorati results.
If we are seeing this meltdown on the left even before “Expelled” officially opens, expect a Big Bang on April 18.
Roving Reporter #3 – Station of the Cross Catholic Radio Station, in Buffalo, NY >>> Play
Ave Maria!
This week Friar Roderic Mary interviews Jim Wright, from the Station of the Cross, at the Doers of the Word Conference in Hamburg, New York, who tells of the exploding Catholic radio station story, sighting that anything is possible with determination and … the Holy Spirit.
Hello-Hola-Bonjour-Buon Giorno, etc. Do you believe that the U.S. can have a pro-life victory this year (or sooner) and spread the good news throughout the world, through pro-life media reform? I do. The Friars are working for this, too. How do I connect with them? The Franciscans of the Immaculate offer Holy Mass at our Motherhouse (www.sistersofcharity.com) and, as you can see, we still work together. I teach Spanish at our all girls’ high school (www.ahfbaltic.org); “direct” the drama–we will do the musical Oliver! this fall; and–joy of joys–moderate our pro-life club, which the students named T.O.P.-Life Club. They have posted wonderful highway billboards in Southeastern Connecticut in the pro-life fight and we now host Pro-Life Coffee Houses to help fund the billboards. (more…)
Ave Maria! Yes, we are front runners for the ‘Silver Fish Award’ at the Vatican’s International Catholic Film Festival in the categories of Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor/Actress for the feature length motion picture that the FI’s in Italy produced titled “Duns Scoto” on the life of Bl. John Duns Scotus. The other two films that are also finalists, and with which we are competing, are listed below. These finalists were chosen from a total of 746 films. The announcement will be made before the festival ends this Saturday, May 21, probably on Thursday. This is a great opportunity to put a spotlight on Bl. John Duns Scotus, the Franciscan scholar, who gave the theological foundation for the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception, winning the title ‘The Marian Doctor’. It is also a great boost to our worldwide media efforts. Please keep us in your prayers that we win.
10min) >>> 
Audio (MP3)
