Turin, 22 January 2009
Iveco is adding its name to the world of film “lending” two vehicles, a Stralis and a Massif, the largest and the smallest vehicles in the range, to the eagerly awaited film “Italians” which goes on general release tomorrow in the cinema.
Produced by Aurelio and Luigi de Laurentis and directed by Giovanni Veronesi, the film tells the story of the vices and virtues of our compatriots abroad and is divided into two episodes with Riccardo Scamarcio and Sergio Castellitto as the protagonists in the first episode which is set in the United Arab Emirates and Carlo Verdone and Dario Bandiera in the second episode which takes places in St Petersburg.
The Stralis, a car transporter packed with luxury Ferraris, features in an episode in which Sergio Castellitto plays the part of a roughish lorry driver, disenchanted after transporting stolen cars in the United Arab Emirates for many years for a Roman organization which takes on a youngster for a few months, played by Scamarcio to whom the older colleague is going to hand over the reins.
Amongst the unexpected and exciting adventures in the middle of the desert, on board the Stralis and pursued by the local police in a Massif, the two tell a story that lurches between laughter and grimacing which is also the feature of the second episode in which Verdone plays a divorced Roman dentist, who owns a Ferrari that is part of the batch of stolen cars in Dubai, travelling to St Petersburg for a conference.
The presence of the two vehicles in the Giovanni Veronesi film is the result of a product placement that allows the Iveco brand to appear in an important film production.
If this is Iveco’s debut on the big screen – previously the world of transport was often a protagonist, like in the film “ Il bestione” by Sergio Corbucci with Giancarlo Giannini at the wheel of a Fiat –, one can equally say that it has already played a part on television in a series in the eighties. The series was “Due assi per un Turbo”, produced by RAI, broadcast in 1987 on channel one, starring Renato D'Amore, Christian Fermont, Philippe Leroy and Alba Motturae, comprising 12 one hour episodes in which two lorry drivers in an Iveco Turbostar "GAMBERO ROSSO", got up to all sorts of escapades.