Luca La Vopa

Varichina was the first openly out homosexual man in Bari in the ‘70s. Ugly, flashy and campy, he was well known for making coarse advances to every man he saw. He was gay, had nothing to hide, and lived a life of celebration! Funny and heartwarming, Varichina: The True Story of the Fake Life of Lorenzo de Santis is a documentary/fiction hybrid looking at someone who was WAY OUT, long before it was socially acceptable.

A man's journey becomes the wonderful experience of a grandfather and his granddaughter. In the intimate evocation of Ernest Hemingway, the old man leads the little girl into the historical memory of the land where the great writer lived. Riding their bicycles and recalling a past of timeless art and culture, the two will reach the most beautiful destination: the one from which to start again.

A young intellectual named Pier Paolo learns from Margherita, his colleague and poetess, that he has been appointed "Master of Holy Week" by the municipality. After meeting Giovanni, a beautiful homeless boy, Pier Paolo begins his surreal journey through bucolic and popular scenery, typical of the South, which becomes a mirror of his soul. He will fight, thus, against the incarnations of desire in order to find his own spirituality.

Antonio, a filmmaker running out of ideas, has a vision of the city's patron, St. Nicholas, who asks him to make a film about his true story. So Antonio sets out on a journey in the myth's footsteps, crossing all the countries where the saint is revered. Turkey, Belgium, Holland, France, Russia, all the way to the United States, where he is better known as Santa Claus, i.e., Santa Claus. A journey in the midst of a melting pot of popular cultures and traditions, with all their contradictions, a journey through colors and religious rigor mixed together giving life to a sacred figure who is, at the same time, a consumerist model.