Amid the ruins of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, a self-appointed, mentally unstable, fiery poet emerged in Fiume in 1919; he seized the city by military force and then proclaimed himself its absolute ruler. Gabriele D’Annunzio’s bizarre Pentecost reign can be seen as a precursor to Italian fascism, and although the Italian state was forced to put an end to this embarrassing 16-month incident, a few years later, with Benito Mussolini’s rise to power, Gabriele D’Annunzio entered the Italian historical pantheon as a national hero. In Igor Bezinovic’s innovative film, which won the Grand Prize at the Rotterdam Film Festival, citizens of Rijeka bring to life the tragicomic chapters of Gabriele D’Annunzio’s 16-month-long grotesque reign of terror.

(port.hu)

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)