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18 September1951
Festa dell'Unità
Author
Angelo Marzadori
Format
8mm
Duration
6'16''
Credits
“Canzoni dal kolchoz” performed by the Ukrainian National Choir. Concert “Women's Day”, CDSA Mass Theater, Moscow - World Festival of Youth and Students 1957

Bologna, 18 September 1951. Angelo Marzadori is in the right place to film the procession passing through the streets of the city, the big parade organised on the occasion of the Festa Nazionale dell'Unità at the Parco della Montagnola. This is the first edition of the national festival that the Communist Party has assigned to the capital of Emilia. But the Prefect got in the way, denying permission to use the large public park of the Giardini Margherita, and instead conceding the Montagnola, a place usually used for the Fiera campionaria, with the nearby Via Irnerio and Piazza 8 Agosto for the leader Palmiro Togliatti's speech. The effect of a corner of the city transformed into the Soviet Union is in any case possible. But one of the themes of the festival is Peace with the danger of the arms race and the atomic bomb, as can be seen from the placards, flags and some floats. We are in the midst of the Cold War. Marzadori had used colour a few months earlier for the May Day parade, which was held at the Giardini Margherita: here, unfortunately, we have to make do with a black-and-white chronicle. In both cases, the character of a popular and identity festival prevails. What will the Prefect have been afraid of? Piazza 8 August certainly cannot be mistaken for Red Square, not even for a day. Marzadori does not flinch and with his 8mm camera gives a comprehensive account of the first National Unity Day, of which we see an excerpt.

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