The Venetian Dilemma
What do you do when a city is so alluring to the entire world that it becomes nearly unlivable for its own citizens? When a city is beautiful, appealing, ready to accept tourists without hesitation, and yet is so fragile that the same tourists that are its lifeblood are also destroying it?
The Venetian Dilemma, a film by two Americans who also live in Venice, poses this question, and provides some insight into both sides of the coin by letting Venetians speak for themselves. We hear from a tough-minded graphic designer who crusades for child care, an older writer who runs a group that petitions the mayor to enforce boat speed limits (heavy backwash from propellers is literally eating away at the foundations of the buildings), a fruit and vegetable vendor fighting to keep his stall in the same campowhere it has been since the 1950s, despite heavy pressure from the government to have it demolished, and finally, a representative of City Hall itself, a charming and well-spoken man who thinks that the solution to many of Venice's problems is a high-speed underwater metro and new convention center.
( La Bella Serenissima )
The Venetian Dilemma, a film by two Americans who also live in Venice, poses this question, and provides some insight into both sides of the coin by letting Venetians speak for themselves. We hear from a tough-minded graphic designer who crusades for child care, an older writer who runs a group that petitions the mayor to enforce boat speed limits (heavy backwash from propellers is literally eating away at the foundations of the buildings), a fruit and vegetable vendor fighting to keep his stall in the same campowhere it has been since the 1950s, despite heavy pressure from the government to have it demolished, and finally, a representative of City Hall itself, a charming and well-spoken man who thinks that the solution to many of Venice's problems is a high-speed underwater metro and new convention center.
( La Bella Serenissima )