The Smile Of The Leader

Every charismatic leader strategically plans to gain popularity by taking obsessive care of his own public image. He does so by exploiting the media power and the technologies available over different historical times. Benito Mussolini, the Italian “Duce”, caught the great opportunity offered to him by the most powerful, popular, and beloved medium of the 20th century: cinema. Guessing its potential, he founded the Istituto Luce in order to spread his own personality cult and create a "new man" in his own image. This documentary is pure editing, based on the Istituto Luce Archive records. The footage shows the mechanisms of consensus building, the main instrument of Populism; how the regime educated boys and girls to grow up as good fascist citizens; and how a nation living in extreme poverty was persuaded to be crucial for the world`s asset.

43ª MOSTRA INTERNACIONAL DE CINEMA

43ª MOSTRA INTERNACIONAL DE CINEMA