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"Name Ferzan Ozpetek. Most impressive achievements Ozpetek&amp;#039;s career is filled with famous awards, but they are not enough to define his success. Important tributes, such as the retrospectives held in New York in 2008 and in Los Angeles in 2010, or the volume Ferzan Ozpetek: Ad occhi aperti by Laura Delli Colli, can help to fully grasp the sense of the small revolution he has introduced in the Italian and international cinema. Things to know He instinctively chooses the actors for his movies; he sometimes writes the script thinking of the actor who could play a certain role. He doesn&amp;#039;t like auditions and rarely&amp;nbsp; chooses his actors with a screen test. All his movies include at least one convivial scene, a moment where members of a family or a group of friends gather around a table to eat; this is not coincidental, because cooking has always fascinated him since he was a child. He&amp;#039;s a passionate cook: he loves Italian food but often experiments with the Turkish cooking tradition. Among his favourite dishes, home-made pizza, ginger chicken and Circassian chicken. Serra Yilmaz and Rosaria De Cicco are his iconic actresses: Yilmaz has appeared in most of his movies, while De Cicco acted in The Ignorant Fairies, Facing Window and in A Perfect Day. Music has a key role in his life and in his movies, too. He has a funny habit: he always includes a song by the Turkish artist Sezen Aksu in the soundtrack of his works. Most of his movies are set in the areas of Rome he knows best: the Testaccio quarter, the Mercati Generali, the Gasometer, the Coliseum area (where Sacred Heart was set). Part of Saturn in Opposition was shot in his apartment, in the Ostiense quarter. Career He has loved cinema since he was seven, when he first watched a film (it was Cleopatra) in a movie theater; his parents didn&amp;#039;t support this passion and wanted him to study in the United States and to start a career in the building trade. Ferzan came to a compromise with them and moved to Italy, to Rome, in 1976. He enrolled on a course of Movie Direction at the Accademia di Arte Drammatica Silvio D&amp;#039;Amico and on the College of Letters at La Sapienza University. Even if his parents didn&amp;#039;t agree with his choices, Ferzan decided to stay in Rome, where he started working as a frame maker and painting (one of his passions). The first turning point in his career arrived in 1982, when he worked as assistant director of Massimo Troisi in the movie Scusate il ritardo and of Maurizio Ponzi in Son Contento, starring Francesco Nuti. After working as first assistant director for Marco Risi, Ricky Tognazzi and Lamberto Bava, in 1996 he directed and produced Hamam, set in Istanbul, starring Alessandro Gassman. In 1997 the movie was presented at the Cannes Film Festival, in the&amp;nbsp; Quinzaine des Realizateurs section. In 1999 he directed his second movie, Harem Suare, starring Marie Gillain and Alex Descas, presented at the Cannes Film Festival, in Un certain regard section. Fame arrived in 2001 with The Ignorant Fairies, starring Stefano Accorsi and Margherita Buy; the comedy about homosexuality received many awards, in Italy and abroad. Facing Window, directed in 2003 and starring Giovanna Mezzogiorno, Raul Bova and Massimo Girotti, became a hit. In 2005 he directed Sacred Heart, starring Barbara Bobulova and Lisa Gastoni, a reflection on religion which got contrasting reviews. In 2007 Saturn in Opposition was released: the movie, dealing with the themes of separation and griefing process, featured many famous Italian actors (Stefano Accorsi, Pierfrancesco Favino, Margherita Buy and Ambra Angiolini, among the others). In 2008 A Perfect Day, based on the novel with the same title by Melania Gaia Mazzucco, was presented at the 65th Venice Film Festival. The drama, set in Rome, features Isabella Ferrari and Valerio Mastrandrea as protagonists. His latest work, Loose Cannons, was written with Ivan Cotroneo: it is set in Puglia and features a star-studded cast, including Riccardo Scamarcio, Ennio Fantastichini, Nicole Grimaudo, Ilaria Occhini and Alessandro Preziosi. The many-sided comedy, which gained a good success with the public, was presented at the Berlinale and at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York. Main awards He has received an impressive number of awards. The Ignorant Fairies won four Silver Ribbons, two Globi d&amp;#039;Oro awards and four Ciak d&amp;#039;Oro awards. It was also awarded as Best Movie at the New York Lesbian and Gay Film Festival in 2002. Facing Window received five David di Donatello awards, four Ciak d&amp;#039;Oro, three Globi d&amp;#039;Oro awards, three awards at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival and one at the Seattle Film Festival. Saturn in Opposition won many awards as well: a David di Donatello, four Silver Ribbons, four Ciak d&amp;#039;Oro and five Globi d&amp;#039;Oro. A Perfect Day received a nomination at the Silver Ribbon Awards and the protagonist, Isabella Ferrari, got a Premio Pasinetti at the Venice Film Festival. His latest movie, Loose Cannons, received ten nominations at the Silver Ribbon Awards (it won five), won two David di Donatello awards, four Ciak d&amp;#039;Oro, four Globi d&amp;#039;Oro and got the important Special Jury Mention at the Tribeca Film Festival. In 2007 the President of the Italian Republic, Giorgio Napolitano, gave him the De Sica award for his contribution to Italian cinema. Current projects He has recently presented Loose Cannons at the London Film Festival. In Rome, the photo exhibition Il pianeta Ferzan Ozpetek has just been closed: it collected a series of pictures shot by Romolo Eucalitto on the set of Ozpetek&amp;#039;s movies. Mentors Gianni Amelio and Elio Petri encouraged him to start working as a director, while Marco Risi, whom Ozpetek worked with as assistant director, trusted his abilities and produced Hamam. He said &amp;quot;The only way to overcome the big crisis, the shock that has arrived and will continue to influence the world of cinema, the 3D revolution, is using emotions.&amp;quot; We love him because His movies are centered on apparently simple stories, through which he&amp;#039;s able to convey an intelligent, deeply human and unpredictable user guide to the world. Birthday February 3rd. Born in Istanbul, Turkey. Lives in Rome, Italy."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.vogue.it/en/news/vogue-arts/2010/11/04/ferzan-ozpetek/>