Abel Ferrara (b. 1951) is probably one of the last great filmmakers whose oeuvre continues to elude the simplest definitions of the auteurist framework. For example, are we able to fashion an inventory of his leitmotifs? Of course we can: catholic iconology and cathloic guilt; a perrenial preoccupation for the act of producing moving images, especially digital ones; tangoes with the concept of Italian-American identity and a split between its two capitals, New York and Rome; a profound attachment to the most squalid tropes of genre cinema (policier, slasher movies, vampire flicks, horror film, rape revenge fantasy etc.), encased in what is otherwise an arthouse cinema mold. Can we claim that he has fetish actors? Of course we can: Harvey Keitel (unforgettable in Ferrara's masterpiece, Bad Lieutenant, 1992), Christopher Walken (King of New York, 1990), and, lately, Willem Dafoe (especially memorable as the titular Pasolini, 2014). However, one of the few living directors who has ever had a shot at working with Madonna (in his chameleonic, self-referential Dangerous Game) never sold out: faithful to his modest beginnings, Ferrara keeps on making these small films, almost artisanal in nature, and at a steady fire, releasing no less than 11 (!) feature fictions and documentaries over the last decade. (One of the reasons why he left behind his natal America for Europe is because the latter continent is much more friendly to micro-budgets.)

Flavia Dima

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Film critic & journalist. Collaborates with local and international outlets, programs a short film festival - BIEFF, does occasional moderating gigs and is working on a PhD thesis about home movies. At Films in Frame, she writes the monthly editorial - The State of Cinema and is the magazine's main festival reporter.

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