Reykjavík Grapevine - 11.03.2005, Page 8

Italy has some 640 channels, a full
quarter of the world’s 2500 television
channels. You would think that
they wouldn’t want for variety. And
yet, as you flick through the infinite
number of channels, they all seem to
be showing the same program. What
is this that so absorbs the Italians?
Nostalgic reminiscnces about the
Roman Empire? The finer points of
Renaissance Art? The infinite variety
of Mediterranean cooking?
No, it seems that almost every
program on offer is some sort of
semi-pornographic version of the
Eurovision song contest. While the
rest of the continent seems to think
one night of the year of this is more
than enough to suit most people’s
needs (at least in the Golden Age
before Idol), Italians seem to make
do with this year round. And in 640
different versions, no less. What
gives?
Heaving Cleavages and the Public
Eye
The average Italian spends around
four hours a day in front of a
television set.
Almost all presenters intertwine
promotional messages into their
programming. This is in addition
to regular advertising, which comes
on every few minutes. Adding
insult to injury, the ads are actually
broadcast at a higher volume than
regular programming. So what’s the
attraction of watching television
where this is what’s on offer?
British journalist Tobias Jones,
author of The Dark Heart of Italy,
writes, “Breasts are ubiquitous, even
boringly so…Italy is the land that
feminism forgot. It’s not that there
aren’t many successful women in
Italy, it’s that they’re never in the
public eye. Unless they come with
heaving cleavages.” 640 channels of
lotteries, horoscopes, TV markets,
and heaving breasts everywhere.
How did it come to this?
The Best Films in the World
In the 50s and 60s, directors like
Fellini, Pasolini and Visconti made
some of the most interesting
films being made anywhere.
At the time, state company
RAI ran Italian TV wholesale.
When, in 1976, broadcasting
was opened up to the private
sector, one might have been
forgiven for thinking that a
country with such directorial
talent and such a long history
of visual artistry would produce
first rate television, once the
restraints had been lifted. The
new media law, introduced that
year, stated that RAI would
still retain the rights to nationwide
broadcasting, but private stations
could broadcast locally.
In 1978, the first private television
station, Telemilano, started
broadcasting in the outskirts of
Milan. Its owner was a man called
Silvio Berlusconi, best known as
owner of the popular local football
club AC Milan. He was soon to
become a household name.
Sesame Street for Beginners
By 1980, there were 1300 local
television stations. But Telemilano
circumvented the law that said
private channels could only broadcast
locally by having its local channels
broadcast the same programs at the
same time, and had the most popular
fare such as Dynasty and Dallas. Italy
was moving from culture exporter to
culture importer. The government
had no choice but to legalize private
national broadcasting as well.
Telemilano, renamed Canale 5,
bought out their major competitors
Italia Uno and Rete 4, which then
formed the Mediaset group, owned
by Berlusconi. Mediaset then bought
most of the remaining independent
channels. Mediaset’s advertising was
handled by the advertising company
Publitalia, also owned by Berlusconi,
which today handles about 60%
of Italy’s television advertising
market. Tobias Jones concludes of
Berlusconi’s broadcasting empire,
“Watching Mediaset is like watching
Sesame Street without the clever bits.”
If this makes you want to go out
and rent a video instead you can at
the local Blockbuster, also owned by
Berlusconi. Small wonder he’s not
only Italy’s richest individual, but
ranks at 45th richest in the world.
Who Wouldn’t Want to Be Rich?
But too much is of course never
enough. Berlusconi entered politics,
and currently holds the post of Italy’s
prime minister. This gives him a
huge influence over the still existent
state television channels, previously
the only televised media out of his
reach.
by Valur Gunnarsson
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Architecture Student Arrested
An Italian architecture student
was arrested on Saturday night.
The student was reported to police
by employees at parliament who
had seen the student sketching
the Alþingi building from a variety
of angles. The student was held
in custody for over 15 hours
before being released. The call
to the police also mentioned that
the student had a scarf wrapped
around his face.
Clubs and Restaurants Part of Tax
Raid
Over the past week police, in
conjunction with the Icelandic Tax
Office, have raided about 20 clubs
and restaurants for suspicion of
tax fraud, dealing in controlled
substances and solicitation of
prostitution. No arrests have so far
been made, but the investigation
is ongoing.
Smoking Ban in 2006?
MP Siv Friðleifsdóttir, along with
other members of parliament,
recently introduced a bill that
would ban smoking in restaurants,
bars, cafés and clubs. If passed,
the ban could go into effect as
early as the spring of 2006. While
many welcome the new law, the
owner of Prikið has said that he
would rather let his employees
wear oxygen masks than ban
smoking in his bar.
Church and State to Separate?
Magnús Axelsson and Rev. Hjörtur
Magni Jóhannsson were elected
into the leadership of SARK, an
organisation working towards the
separation of church and state.
Rev. Jóhannsson was quoted as
saying, “It’s a fact that there isn’t
religious freedom in this country
when billions of krónur stream out
into one faith.”
Prisoner Suicide Taken to Court
The mother of Jóna Sigurveig
Guðmundsdóttir, a mother of
three and an inmate at the
women’s prison in Kópavogur who
committed suicide last November,
says she will let the system decide
who bears responsibility for her
daughter’s death. The mother
contends that her daughter had
shown many calls for help and that
they were all ignored. The mental
health group Geðhjálp will assist
her in the investigation.
Bubbi Morthens Sells Out
Completely
Musician Bubbi Morthens, director
of Íslandsbanki Bjarni Ármannsson
and director of insurance company
Sjóvá Þorgils Óttar Mathiesen
signed a deal yesterday whereby
530 of Morthen’s songs were sold
to Sjóvá. Morthens can expect
to make tens of millions from
the deal. Said Morthens, “This is
a great recognition, one who’s
time has come, that Icelandic
musicians make money here in
Iceland.” Sjóvá was ordered last
week to pay 27 million krónur in
damages for their part in a price-
fixing scandal between them and
two other insurance companies.
The first thing you notice about Italy is its beauty. The
beauty of its landscape, its art, its architecture, its well
dressed and immaculately groomed people. The second thing
you notice, as you step off a beautiful street into a beautiful
room in a beautiful hotel and turn on the TV is that
Italian television is, by and large, terrible.
THE MAN WHO
MURDERED
ITALY’S CULTURE
Upon running for office, he
claimed he intended to sell his
Mediaset channels to avoid any
conflict of interest. Once elected,
he instead passed a law making the
prime minister immune from any
corruption charges.
Berlusconi’s popularity, at least
among a large part of the population,
comes from two sources. Partly
because he’s rich. And who wouldn’t
want to be rich? This has made him
a hero to many. The other reason is
his uncanny ability to present himself
as man of the people fighting against
government legislation. Until, of
course, he and the government
became one and the same.
Why TV Matters
And who’d have thunk it, but culture
actually matters. Spanish cinema
was for a long time living in Italy’s
shadow, the Spaniards having no
equivalent to Fellini, Visconti and
Pasolini. Two decades ago, Italians
were buying twice as many cinema
tickets as the Spaniards. Now, the
Spanish are going more often to the
cinema, and Italy has no equivalent
to Almodóvar or bright young thing
Alejandro Amenábar (director of
The Sea Inside). Of course, Spanish
language films have a built-in
market in South America and even
in the US, whereas Italy previously
succeeded in spite of language, this
no longer seems to be the case.
The decline of Italian cinema versus
Spanish cinema is symptomatic
of a bigger trend. Spain, with a
population of 40 million, has created
4.5 million new jobs in the past
decade; Italy, with a population
of 58 million, has created half
that number. In Spain, poverty
is declining; in Italy, it is rising.
Perhaps the decline in culture has
led to the economic decline; perhaps
it is the other way around. But
the decline of Italian cinema has
probably not been taking place in a
void away from the decline of Italian
television.
As the Italian screenwriter Alberto
Marini, currently working in Spain,
says in a recent edition of Newsweek,
“Italian cinema keeps making
comedies with the same actors,
reproducing the same things and
pretending they are new.”
When people spend half of their
non-working, non-sleeping hours
watching TV, is it too fanciful to
suppose that it matters what they
watch?
“Italy is the land that
feminism forgot.”
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