When one of the greatest British actors and directors meets the queen of detective stories. In recent years Kenneth Branagh has begun adapting Agatha Christie's most famous novels for the cinema, impersonating with originality and sophistication the most famous of her characters: Hercule Poirot. Giunti Odeon offers the first two films of this ‘series’, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the death of the queen of crime fiction.

Three masterpieces of Italian silent films (at Giunti Odeon in splendid new restored versions with original musical accompaniment) to discover the fascination of "diva-film". Three films inhabited by formidable women and actresses, who a century ago became absolute protagonists of the culture of the image. Ma l'amore mio non muore (1913), Lyda Borelli's first film and the origin of the diva-film: a plunge into the imagination, culture and Italian Art Nouveau fashion. Sangue Blue (1914): Francesca Bertini achieves diva status in a sumptuous marital and maternal melodrama. Assunta Spina (1915), 'the' film of Bertini, also director: her greatest success, her most passionate role, the progenitor of cinematic realism.

The splendid "European Fairy Tales" series of animated films made in the 1970s and based on folklore tales and stories from various European nations, from Italy to France, from Belgium to Hungary, from Switzerland to England. The shorts in rotation take their cue from Carnival: fifteen short animated films resulting from international co-productions, each of which tells a fairy tale belonging to the folk tradition of a European country.

An extraordinary journey through the myths, masterpieces and legends of Hollywood cinema. From Keaton to Kubrick, from Welles to Coppola and Scorsese, at Giunti Odeon a series of documentaries, rich in footage and testimonials, on a century and more of American cinema: a compelling account of the greatest and most dazzling industry of dreams.

At Giunti Odeon, three great classics of American cinema from the 1970s will immerse you once again in the psychedelic and futuristic atmospheres of a decade that forever marked the imagination of cinema, music, visual culture and fashion.

Beauty and the star-system, talent and fragility, the lights of the cinema and the shadows of life: Giunti Odeon pays tribute to one of the most extraordinary divas in the history of cinema, Marilyn Monroe, with three of her most famous and iconic films, authentic masterpieces directed by as many great directors. 

Antonella Manduca presents her new book Il nascondiglio perfetto (Golem Edizioni) at Giunti Odeon. The meeting will be introduced by art historian Francesca Roberti. She will be in conversation with the author, Lara Fabbrizzi, Councillor of the Municipality of Impruneta.

The Book:

Events and circumstances that occurred thirty years apart intertwine by chance along two parallel timelines. In the first, Giulia, who works as a cloakroom attendant at the Jimmy club to support herself while studying, discovers that she possesses an unsettling gift: the ability to perceive emotionally violent events through touch alone. When Yeva, the Armenian caregiver of an elderly antiquarian, entrusts her with a coat for safekeeping, Giulia is struck by the vision of a horrific crime.

The second storyline begins in 1994. A young man, Augusto Bellandi, an aspiring antiquarian, is recruited into the workshop of a renowned art dealer from Turin: the miserly, irascible, and capricious Gualberto Foresta, whose office is located in the rooms of an old sacristy. Forced, despite himself, to indulge the eccentric whims of his mentor, Augusto cannot possibly imagine the dramatic and criminal consequences that will follow.

The Author:

Antonella Manduca was born in Pinerolo (TO) on September 21, 1961. She is a writer whose literary work draws nourishment from two fundamental worlds: art and music. It is within this borderland that her stories take shape, where themes of value, mystery, and beauty naturally converge.

She has a classical background, developed over time and enriched by a significant experience as an art dealer in France—between Cannes, Paris, and Nice—where she lived for approximately twenty years. That universe, with its lights and shadows, has become an integral part of her narrative DNA.

At the same time, music has always marked her path. Her deep passion for singing has led her not only to perform as a chorister, but also to take an active role as a board member of the Accademia Corale Stefano Tempia of Turin, the oldest choir in Italy. This experience is also a constant source of inspiration for works that intertwine storytelling with emotional scores.

Alongside her literary activity, she is engaged in civic and social life as a minority City Councillor in the Municipality of Porte and as a board member of Zonta Club International, Pinerolo Section.

She favors noir and thriller genres, which allow her to explore the deepest aspects of the human condition. However, she firmly believes that writing should transcend boundaries; for this reason, her works often move across and blend with other genres.

At Giunti Odeon the traditional Sunday appointment with all the great Disney and Pixar classics! To see and see again the great animated films that over many years have enchanted generations of viewers, young and old!

At GO, the presentation of Questa non è una guida a Bali (Solferino) by Chiara Milani.
For the occasion, the author will be in conversation with director Paolo Genovese, who wrote the book’s preface.

The Book

“I knew nothing about Bali, except for what I had occasionally seen on social media: white beaches stretching as far as the eye could see, waterfalls in the jungle, and temples perched above the ocean. Which, in any case, seemed like a good place to start.”

When Chiara buys her first ticket to Bali together with her partner Mauro, she is thinking only of a holiday: something easy, uncomplicated. She is mistaken. On that journey, and on many subsequent stays, the island reveals not only its beauty—breathtaking landscapes of temples and rice fields, the richness of its food and colors—but much more.

In the darkness of a sleepless night, in the relentless pounding rain, or in the unexpected event that cancels an excursion and takes you elsewhere, Chiara discovers beauty. She finds even more of it in the generosity and friendship of people like her guide Wilan, willing to share days and thoughts with her.

In this book, Chiara recounts her experiences and encounters: prayers in sacred places and jungle excursions, journeys on makeshift means of transport, and celebrations experienced by chance. She shares what she has learned through immersion in Balinese spirituality and the wisdom of its people: patience, acceptance, and the very nature of happiness. She illustrates the island’s traditions, its language, and the paths that lead respectfully closer to its soul.

She also traces out valuable itineraries for those who wish to discover the island not as tourists, but as travelers: intimate, sensory routes through lesser-known places, capable of returning us to the present stronger, richer in life, and more open to joy and love.

The Author

Born in 1989, Chiara Milani began her career at a very young age, in 2007, as an intern on film sets. She worked as an assistant alongside experienced script supervisors, from whom she learned the foundations of the profession. In 2015, she took part in the production of Perfetti Sconosciuti, a project that marked a turning point in her professional career.

From then on, Chiara alternated between television and film productions. Among the projects she has worked on are Nero a Metà (dir. Marco Pontecorvo), Scordato (dir. Rocco Papaleo), Come un gatto in tangenziale (dir. Riccardo Milani), The Place (dir. Paolo Genovese), American Night (dir. Alessio Jim Della Valle), Cassamortari (dir. Claudio Amendola), and, most recently, the Disney Plus series I leoni di Sicilia, directed by Paolo Genovese.

Daughter of renowned director Riccardo Milani, Chiara is now also a writer. Questa non è una guida a Bali is her debut book, recently published by Solferino, with a preface by Paolo Genovese.

A selection of extremely rare films of extraordinary historical value on the life of cities and landscapes in Italy at the beginning of the 20th century, made by early cinematographers and restored for the occasion.

François Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard: two great masters of film history, undisputed protagonists of an unrepeatable season as the French Nouvelle vague. First friends, then rivals, very different from each other, but both bound by a visceral love for cinema: at Giunti Odeon a series of documentary films recounting their contrasting relationship. 

At Giunti Odeon, Alberto Demagistris presents his book Quindi... Sette incontri del duemilaventicinque (Edizioni Fondazione Poma Liberatutti), in conversation with journalist Simone Innocenti.

The book

The title echoes a word frequently used in informal conversation and, at the same time, serves as the trait d’unionlinking the voices collected in the volume. The book brings together biographical narratives, digressions, and free-flowing thoughts, born from the rapid give-and-take of the interview format. The publication takes shape as a narrative experiment halfway between spoken and written language, in which the balance between spontaneity and readability becomes a structural element of the editorial project.

The book is built around seven encounters, each different in tone, language, and perspective, yet united by a common direction: a dialogue between the Foundation and those who, over the course of 2025, agreed to sit down and talk about themselves with Alberto Demagistris.

There is don Amleto Spicciani, an authoritative and familiar voice in the local area with a background as a history teacher, who weaves together spirituality and social awareness, offering a view of the present capable of reconciling roots and future.

There is Skim, graffiti artist and painter from Scandicci, who transformed the Foundation’s headquarters into a visionary landscape inhabited by dreamlike architectures inspired by Città invisibili by Calvino, in one of his many exhibitions spanning canvases and colored walls.

Then there is music, represented by the Piqued Jacks, a Tuscan band with an international outlook, who reached the stage of Eurovision 2023 in Liverpool. Two of its members, Andrea Lazzeretti and Francesco Bini, are actively involved in the POMA community, carrying out work with children that combines play, musical education, and passion.

Among the voices that best represent the Foundation’s bond with its territory is that of poet and literary critic Paolo Fabrizio Iacuzzi, originally from Pistoia and director of the Premio Internazionale Ceppo.

Nicola Rignanese, an actor from Foggia, has been present for years on theatrical stages and in many films of Italian cinema. Having fallen in love with POMA, he led an intensive theatre workshop, transforming shared time into a small experiment in scenic coexistence.

With a more reflective approach, deeply rooted in the body, there is Stefano Filippi—director, trainer, and author. A longtime friend of POMA, where he has brought his theatrical practice grounded in attention, listening, and awareness, poised between performance and spiritual research.

Finally, actress Maria Cassi, clown and internationally renowned performer, with her unmistakable blend of comedy, storytelling, and gesture.

The project is part of the editorial activities promoted by Fondazione POMA Liberatutti within the Appunti Palatiniseries. Conceived as the first in a sequence of stories to be presented on the anniversaries of the Foundation, the book serves as a tool to collect and preserve the memory of the people and dialogues that, year after year, have drawn close to the Foundation.

Quindi… is a tribute to the word as a form of knowledge, to listening as a cultural practice, and to relationships as the driving force of every meaningful experience.

Fondazione POMA Liberatutti

On the banks of the Pescia river, in the town of the same name, stands Fondazione POMA Liberatutti. A multifunctional center conceived to stimulate free thought and encourage encounters among different initiatives and artistic forms. Created within a renovated former factory, the Foundation presents itself as a cultural factory. The space hosts art exhibitions, live performances, conferences, and events ranging from music and theatre to the visual arts, involving both established artists and emerging talents.

Alongside cultural events, it offers a rich and constantly evolving range of educational activities: workshops in writing, painting, and sculpture; foreign language learning; yoga, tai chi, chess, as well as a cooking school designed to unite creativity and gastronomic tradition.

The Refettorio is the meeting point par excellence—more than just a restaurant—where performances and moments of social interaction blend with outstanding cuisine.

Guided by an inclusive philosophy free from ideological constraints, Fondazione POMA is a laboratory for personal growth and sharing, where dialogue and the pursuit of beauty intertwine in every activity.

A rich selection of films shot on the most spectacular and inaccessible mountains and made by Mario Fantin, the explorer with a camera. Starting in the Alps, since the 1950s, Fantin has joined the most adventurous expeditions to the four corners of the globe, with the aim of returning home to take part in them in film form. Often in the retinue of Guido Monzino, one of the greatest explorers of the 20th century, Fantin took his 16mm camera with him on more than thirty expeditions. On each occasion, he combines chronicling punctiliousness and the need to satisfy a precise desire for knowledge with the ecstatic dimension of an eye imbued with visions on the edge of the possible.

An 'other' look at America. Low budgets, little-known actors or stars who put themselves on the line, original stories, far from clichés and stereotypes, able to excite and make us reflect. At Giunti Odeon three cult films of American independent cinema made in recent years.

A much-loved guest returns to GO: Gianrico Carofiglio, presenting his latest book Viaggio in Italia (Touring) in conversation with Francesca Santolini.

The Book:

In a country that has been extensively narrated, spectacularized, and at times trivialized, there is still room for surprise. At the edges of maps, in details and hidden corners, there exists a restless dimension that only a clear yet visionary gaze can bring into view. The visible cities of a great storyteller—from Bari to Venice, from Palermo to Turin—are woven into a narrative marked by a joyful sense of disorientation, moving in many directions without a fixed destination.

A cartographer of the invisible, Carofiglio guides us with the pace of a flâneur, inviting us to discover light within shadow, hidden beauty in details and small stories. He reminds us that it is detours and chance encounters that reveal unexpected and surprising horizons.

The Author:

Gianrico Carofiglio is an Italian writer, former magistrate, and former politician. Appointed to the judiciary in 1986, he served as a pretore in Prato, a Public Prosecutor in Foggia, and later as a Deputy Prosecutor at the Anti-Mafia District Directorate in Bari. In 2008, he was elected to the Italian Senate for the Democratic Party.

His first novel, Testimone inconsapevole (Sellerio, 2002), inaugurated the Italian legal thriller and introduced the character of lawyer Guido Guerrieri. The novel received several debut awards, including the Premio del Giovedì “Marisa Rusconi,” Premio Rhegium Iulii, Premio Città di Cuneo, and Premio Città di Chiavari. Further novels featuring Guerrieri followed with Sellerio: Ad occhi chiusi (2003)—winner of the Premio Lido di Camaiore, Premio delle Biblioteche di Roma, and named “best international noir of the year” in Germany in 2007 by a jury of booksellers and journalists—and Ragionevoli dubbi (2006), which won the Premio Fregene and Premio Viadana in 2007 and the Premio Tropea in 2008.

Among his many books are Il passato è una terra straniera (Rizzoli, 2004), winner of the Premio Bancarella 2005 and adapted into a film produced by Fandango in 2008; the graphic novel Cacciatori nelle tenebre (with his brother Francesco, Rizzoli, 2007), winner of the Premio Martoglio; L’arte del dubbio (Sellerio, 2007); Né qui né altrove(Laterza, 2008); Il paradosso del poliziotto (Nottetempo, 2009); Le perfezioni provvisorie (Sellerio, 2010); Il silenzio dell’onda (Rizzoli, 2011); Il bordo vertiginoso delle cose (Rizzoli, 2013); and La casa nel bosco (written with Francesco Carofiglio, 2014).

More recent publications with Einaudi include Una mutevole verità (2014), La regola dell’equilibrio, Passeggeri notturni, L’estate fredda (2016), Alle tre del mattino (2017), La misura del tempo (2019), and Non esiste saggezza. Edizione definitiva (2020). Other works include Della gentilezza e del coraggio. Breviario di politica e altre cose(Feltrinelli, 2020), La disciplina di Penelope (Mondadori, 2021), La nuova manomissione delle parole (Feltrinelli, 2021), Rancore (Einaudi, 2022), L’ora del caffè. Manuale di conversazione per generazioni incompatibili (Einaudi, 2022), L’orizzonte della notte (Einaudi, 2024), and Elogio dell’ignoranza e dell’errore (Einaudi, 2024).

Giunti Odeon celebrates female cinema, proposing three cult films with women as the absolute protagonists. Tenacious and passionate, torn between difficult choices and passionate loves, those told in these two films are the women who stop at nothing and who are not afraid to face the pitfalls of life, without giving up their own identity.

At Giunti Odeon a selection of American classics from the 1980s! Colourful, crazy, experimental, joyful and dark at the same time: the films of that decade are the kaleidoscope of a renewed and euphoric society, but not without its shadows. Here then are the films of masters such as Robert Zemeckis, David Cronenberg, Terry Gilliam, Martin Scorsese and many other cult films to see and see again!

At Giunti Odeon the traditional Sunday appointment with the great Disney and Pixar classics! To see and see again the great animated films that over many years have enchanted generations of viewers, young and old!

In collaboration with Oxfam, Riccardo Luna presents Qualcosa è andato storto (Solferino) at Giunti Odeon, together with Tomaso Montanari (Rector of the Università per Stranieri di Siena) and Roberto Barbieri (Director of Oxfam Italia). The event is moderated by Martina Pennisi (journalist at Corriere della Sera).

The Book:

For a long time, the internet and the web seemed like humanity’s most powerful tools for progress since the invention of the printing press or electricity. They were supposed to “break down walls and build bridges,” giving rise to the idea of “tech democracy”—a new era of democracy enhanced by the internet, open to direct citizen participation and oversight. It was the new promised land, where everyone would finally be happy.

Yet, as it has become clear, the web has instead become one of the most insidious tools undermining democracies. Over twenty years of social media, we have lost a shared vision of the future—a better world we could reach together. When, exactly, did this change occur? When did children stop dreaming of becoming astronauts and start wanting to be influencers and content creators? And why? Were we deluded, or was the deck of cards we were playing with rigged from the start?

Riccardo Luna poses these and other questions about the identity of today’s web, tracing its history back to its origins—before it was corrupted by the narcissism fueled by the digital economy, before algorithms amplified fake news simply because it drove traffic. The book takes readers on a journey through the epic of Silicon Valley: from the early days when tech entrepreneurs seemed benevolent, to the Big Tech pact with Donald Trump’s White House, and to the tragic events in Gaza, where grassroots use of social media helped bypass censorship and spark a global mobilization. A sign, perhaps, that nothing is entirely lost, and that there is still time to change the future.

The Author:

RICCARDO LUNA is one of Italy’s most authoritative journalists on innovation, technology, and sustainability. He was the first editor of Wired, served as the government’s Digital Champion at the EU, and has curated many successful events such as Stazione Futuro, the Maker Faire, Italian Tech Week, and the Venice Climate Week. A long-time contributor to la Repubblica, since 2025 he has been a columnist for Corriere della Sera.

Silvia Bencini and Luca Bravi will present Auschwitz: Percorsi di memoria attiva (FrancoAngeli), together with Ugo Caffaz (Tuscany Region), Giovanni Gozzini (University of Siena), and Stefano Oliviero (University of Florence). The discussion will be moderated by Nura Abdel Mohsen (Fondazione Museo della Deportazione di Prato).

The Book
The volume explores educational pathways of memory, starting from the idea of “crossing through Auschwitz”—not merely visiting it, but transforming it from a crystallized monument into a tool for learning. It outlines a training model that—through places and objects serving as bridges between past and present—can be applied to any site of memory.

In this regenerative process of learning to know, recognize, and narrate multiple stories, the account of death always aims to reconnect with the possibility of life: to learn the “lesson” of Auschwitz, of Rwanda, of Srebrenica, up to the conflicts of today, and to the shores of Cutro and Lampedusa. The aim is not to declare everything identical to Auschwitz, but to search for a pedagogy of memories—a driving force for educational dialogue and democracy in the present.

The Authors

Silvia Bencini is a research fellow at the Department of Education, Languages, Intercultural Studies, Literature, and Psychology at the University of Florence. Her work focuses on the social history of education in relation to European memory policies and on historical-educational processes aimed at inclusion and minority participation.

Luca Bravi is a researcher at the same department of the University of Florence, where he teaches History of Communication and Educational Processes. His research focuses on the social history of education in relation to European inclusion policies, the history of media and their impact on educational contexts, and historical processes of inclusion through the enhancement of European memory. He has collaborated with the National Office Against Racial Discrimination of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers and with the Tuscany Region on memory policies addressed to schools.

1945-1975: this was the golden age of Italian cinema, full of masterpieces that left their mark on the entire history of film. From the ruins of war arose Neorealism, the “movement” that, with Rossellini, Visconti and De Sica-Zavattini, changed the way cinema was made and conceived forever. From the early 1950s, the revolutionary charge of Neorealism faded, becoming contaminated with popular genres such as comedy and other forms of popular cinema, passing through the golden 1960s with the affirmation of great auteur cinema (Fellini, Antonioni, Pasolini, etc.), “Italian-style comedy” and other genres (such as spaghetti westerns), until the anxieties, experiments and new sensibilities of the early 1970s. A long history in which Italian cinema reflects and reworks the enormous political, social, economic and cultural changes experienced by the country during those crucial three decades.

1945-1975: this was the golden age of Italian cinema, full of masterpieces that left their mark on the entire history of film. From the ruins of war arose Neorealism, the “movement” that, with Rossellini, Visconti and De Sica-Zavattini, changed the way cinema was made and conceived forever. From the early 1950s, the revolutionary charge of Neorealism faded, becoming contaminated with popular genres such as comedy and other forms of popular cinema, passing through the golden 1960s with the affirmation of great auteur cinema (Fellini, Antonioni, Pasolini, etc.), “Italian-style comedy” and other genres (such as spaghetti westerns), until the anxieties, experiments and new sensibilities of the early 1970s. A long history in which Italian cinema reflects and reworks the enormous political, social, economic and cultural changes experienced by the country during those crucial three decades.

1945-1975: this was the golden age of Italian cinema, full of masterpieces that left their mark on the entire history of film. From the ruins of war arose Neorealism, the “movement” that, with Rossellini, Visconti and De Sica-Zavattini, changed the way cinema was made and conceived forever. From the early 1950s, the revolutionary charge of Neorealism faded, becoming contaminated with popular genres such as comedy and other forms of popular cinema, passing through the golden 1960s with the affirmation of great auteur cinema (Fellini, Antonioni, Pasolini, etc.), “Italian-style comedy” and other genres (such as spaghetti westerns), until the anxieties, experiments and new sensibilities of the early 1970s. A long history in which Italian cinema reflects and reworks the enormous political, social, economic and cultural changes experienced by the country during those crucial three decades.

1945-1975: this was the golden age of Italian cinema, full of masterpieces that left their mark on the entire history of film. From the ruins of war arose Neorealism, the “movement” that, with Rossellini, Visconti and De Sica-Zavattini, changed the way cinema was made and conceived forever. From the early 1950s, the revolutionary charge of Neorealism faded, becoming contaminated with popular genres such as comedy and other forms of popular cinema, passing through the golden 1960s with the affirmation of great auteur cinema (Fellini, Antonioni, Pasolini, etc.), “Italian-style comedy” and other genres (such as spaghetti westerns), until the anxieties, experiments and new sensibilities of the early 1970s. A long history in which Italian cinema reflects and reworks the enormous political, social, economic and cultural changes experienced by the country during those crucial three decades.

1945-1975: this was the golden age of Italian cinema, full of masterpieces that left their mark on the entire history of film. From the ruins of war arose Neorealism, the “movement” that, with Rossellini, Visconti and De Sica-Zavattini, changed the way cinema was made and conceived forever. From the early 1950s, the revolutionary charge of Neorealism faded, becoming contaminated with popular genres such as comedy and other forms of popular cinema, passing through the golden 1960s with the affirmation of great auteur cinema (Fellini, Antonioni, Pasolini, etc.), “Italian-style comedy” and other genres (such as spaghetti westerns), until the anxieties, experiments and new sensibilities of the early 1970s. A long history in which Italian cinema reflects and reworks the enormous political, social, economic and cultural changes experienced by the country during those crucial three decades.