There is a plant universe that populates our mountains, an ecosystem that the collective imagination tends to crystallize into a static green postcard to be contemplated from a distance. To undermine this superficial vision it arrives in Italian cinemas Forest – The future has ancient rootsthe new documentary feature film by directors Giorgia Lorenzato and Manuel Zarpellon.
Produced by Cineblend, the cinematographic work inaugurated a national tour that will touch key regions such as Lombardy, Veneto, Liguria, Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Piedmont, taking the general public behind the scenes of contemporary forestry. At this link you can consult the list of dates.
The narrative plants its roots on Monte Meletta, in the municipal territory of Gallio, on the Altopiano dei Sette Comuni: a geographical area profoundly mutilated by the devastation of the Vaia storm and by the subsequent, equally destructive, attack by the bark beetle, the small beetle that found in the felled spruce trees the ideal nourishment to proliferate excessively.
Beyond ideological environmentalism: a school among the trees
The beating heart of the documentary focuses on overcoming a contrast that is as widespread as it is sterile: that between abstract naturalistic protection and the intensive exploitation of the woody resource. Through the screenplay edited by Salvatore Frisina together with the two directors, the film highlights responsible forest management, translating the forest into a living bioeconomy laboratory.
Four students of a professional course move in front of the lens – Filippo Sambugaro, Melani Mussoi, Silvia Minella and Tommaso Casagrande – guided in the field by instructors and expert woodcutters Giorgio and Michele Sambugaro. The crucial passage from classroom theory to the harshness of practice on the slope is transformed into an ecological bildungsroman, where the technical gesture of cutting and reading the invisible signals of nature require an absolute culture of safety and a profound respect for the biological rhythms of the mountain.
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Technology and scientific alliances for security
A fundamental emphasis within the assembly is assigned to the technological evolution of personal protective equipment (PPE). The safety safeguard is not described as a mere regulatory or commercial obligation, but rather as an indispensable shield resulting from a close synergy between industrial research in the field and workers on the front line.
To scientifically support this choral fresco, authoritative voices from the Italian academic and technical panorama intervene, including the professors of the University of Padua Andrea Battisti (entomologist), Emanuele Lingua (forester) and Stefano Grigolato (expert in forestry mechanization), supported by the journalist of the Compagnia delle Foreste Luigi Torreggiani, by the forestry doctor Dimitri De Gol and by safety specialists such as Giorgio Pielli, Luca Canzan, Massimo Ferraresi, Alessandro Caltagirone and Michele Benincà.
Enriched by the chromatic photography of Uber Mancin and the sound of Enrico Lenarduzzi, the film – sponsored by the CAI, the TESAF department of the University of Padua and the Associazione Rete Donne Foreste – demonstrates how the future of the mountains inevitably depends on highly qualified professionals.
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