Italians flocked to the cinema over the Easter weekend. And Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, the third installment of the prequel to the Harry Potter saga, climbed in its first week of programming at the Box Office, reaching the top position and the €4 million mark. A performance that also pushes the overall box office up 21% compared to the previous weekend (€4,413,766 against €3,658,282).  Sonic 2 The film grossed €663,000 over the weekend, reaching a total of €2 million 460 thousand. Morbius loses one position and occupies the third step of the podium with a little more than 200 thousand euros (€2.8 million euros total takings).

 n the fourth position, the only other new entry of the weekend: Gli idoli delle donne, by the comedy duo Lillo and Greg, with Corrado Guzzanti in the cast, has grossed 172 thousand euros and was screened in over 300 theaters. In the fifth position, down two steps, the animated film Troppo cattivi, collects about €162 thousand (over 2.1 million total). The Batman drops to the sixth position with  €93 thousand over the weekend, but grosses €10 million in total.

Seventh place for Corro da te, the rom-com by Riccardo Milani with Pierfrancesco Favino and Miriam Leone (€75,000 in the weekend, about 2.3 million in total). Following is C’Mon C’Mon by Mike Mills with Joaquin Phoenix, with €55,000; La figlia oscura, the first film by Maggie Gyllenhaal based on Elena Ferrante, has reached position number 9 with €48,000. Last in the weekend top ten is Tra due mondi, the drama film by Emmanuel Carrere with Juliette Binoche, based on the investigative novel by Florence Aubenas’  “Le quai de Ouistreham” on the ‘invisible’ precarious workforce (€35,000).

The positive box office figures are the indicator of a new vitality that is also reflected in Italian productions. In Veneto, in San Vito di Cadore, a town immersed in the spectacular setting of the Dolomites mountains, the location scouting for the film Improvvisamente Natale, with the support of the Veneto Film Commission, has been completed. Executive producer Mario Mazzarotto for Guglielmo Marchetti’s Notorious Pictures announced the start of shooting on May 30. The film, a Christmas family comedy directed by Francesco Patierno, will star Diego Abatantuono in the role of Grandpa Lorenzo, and at his side well-known faces of Italian cinema: Violante Placido, Lodo Guenzi, Nino Frassica, Mago Forest (Michele Foresta), Antonio Catania, Anna Galiena, Gloria Guida, and Luca Vecchi.

In Tuscany, in the village of Montalcino – from which the famous red wine Brunello takes its name – the film La stranezza by Roberto Andò is being shot. The movie is inspired to the famous drama by Luigi Pirandello “Sei personaggi in cerca d’autore” (Six characters in search of an author) and among the protagonists of the cast, there is Toni Servillo who will play Pirandello, the comic duo composed by Salvo Ficarra and Valentino Picone, Donatella Finocchiaro and Luigi Lo Cascio. In Città della Pieve, in Umbria, shooting is underway for Presto sarà domani, a short film directed by Michele Placido with Carolina Crescentini and Riccardo Scamarcio.