fiume o morte!

In Fiume o morte!, director Igor Bezinović brings together three hundred locals to re-stage the surreal 1919 occupation of Rijeka by poet-warrior Gabriele D’Annunzio. This re-enactement, both punk and playful, becomes a political act. Through a feverish mix of archives, performances, and testimonies, the film playfully and sharply dismantles the machinery of nationalist propaganda, exposing the toxic legacies of fascism. D’Annunzio appears as a grotesque — yet visionary — prototype of the authoritarian clown, foreshadowing many others we need not name.