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The Tree of Wooden Clogs
A re-release of Ermanno Olmi's celebrated drama, which collected the coveted Palme d'Or at the 1978 Cannes Film Festival. The setting is the rolling countryside of Bergamo in 1898 where four peasant families tend the soil for a landlord, who takes the lion's share of the profits. The clans share a farmhouse where they sow the seeds of revolution and discuss the arrest of political prisoners. When one father, Batisti (Luigi Ornaghi), decides to cut down a poplar tree on the property in order to fashion a pair of wooden shoes for his son, the landlord is incensed and demands that Batisti and his wife Batistina (Francesca Moriggi) leave. The remaining families are powerless to intervene, knowing their livelihoods depend on keeping their heads beneath the parapet.
