We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Alessandro Gentile a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Alessandro, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.
A meaningful project is my most recently directed short film, “Della”. I was approached by an old neighbor Rachel Ellner, who was interested in producing a short film about two estranged sisters. I had just completed my first film titled “Lodo” that had done well on the festival circuit. I even won the prestigious Tim Burton Award for directing at the 2022 Burbank Int’l Film Festival. The reason it’s so special is because some very supportive individuals participated on the project. My new producing partner Heather Flores, who was with me every step of the way. Flores budgeted, produced and even acted in the film. We had just established our production company Radium 88 Productions and came together at the right time in life. We both wanted to develop and create projects of like-minded topics. I also had the privilege of directing my 8 year old daughter Lucy Mae Gentile, as the lead actresses flashback young self. Plus, had my 13 year old son on the set as a production assistant.
Alessandro, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I started my journey as a director back in college. I studied director greats I admired like Stanley Kubrick, Alfred Hitchcock, and Wong Kar Wai. In 2001 I received my bachelors degree at the University of California at Santa Barbara in Film Studies. In 2002 I directed my first documentary on a Burning Man grant artist titled “Firefall: Road to Burningman”, but I decided to take a step back and learn more about storytelling. I ventured into cinematography and ended up shooting my first narrative feature film in 2003. I’ve been working in the industry as a cinematographer ever since but with the intention of transitioning into full time directing. I had co-written a script back in 2016 titled “Lodo” and was eager to direct it. My producing partner at the time was able to line up some funding and we began principal photography in 2020. The film was completed in 2021 and went on to win various awards on the festival circuit. Shortly after I began developing and writing my next film titled “Della”. “Della” was filmed in 2022 and is now in post-production. In the midst of all of this I directed a new documentary along with Executive Producer Melissa Richardson Banks (“Chicano Collection”; Cheech Marin) and my producing partner Heather Flores (“Chicano Collection”) focused on Chicano photojournalist Luis C. Garza titled “Razón De Ser: Luis C. Garza”. We are hoping to World Premiere the film this year in Los Angeles.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
A pivotal moment came in 2022 when I was the cinematographer on a horror proof of concept project and realized that some things are left out of my personal control. In this case the director had taken on too many team member roles and carried a mountain of stress. All blame went out in various directions and no responsibility was ever taken on the directors part. As I sat in front of him at the coffee shop while he was firing me, something clicked inside me. First off I had never been fired before but I came to the realization that I needed to stop putting my energy into other directors passion projects. It was an eye opening moment but sometimes you need to experience these hard lessons to push you through in your life journey. In the end it has just made me a stronger director.
Is there mission driving your creative journey?
My goal is to tell stories that impact audiences and tackle topics that intrigue me. As a Latino I feel like it’s my obligation to continue finding my voice in this independent film world.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.r88productions.com/
- Instagram: @r88prod
- Other: @alessandro_dop ; @dellashortfilm
Image Credits
Photos by Zhi Zhi Burton Flores Subjects: Alessandro Gentile, Lucy Mae Gentile, Kai Gentile