Draquila

(Silvio Berlusconi as Draquila)

Feeling a slight case of cabin fever and with a few dollars remaing from my paycheck I decided to escape the house and architectural school with a movie viewing. I decided to check out the Italian vampire movie "Draquila --Italy Trembles" as Italian horror movies are the best. Hoping to see the next "Suspiria" I headed on down to The Paramount.

Imagine my surprise when I realized Draquila is not Italian for Dracula, but instead
"Draquila--Italy Trembles" by director Sabina Guzzanti, is a political documentary following the Berlusconi government's exploitation of an earthquake in the town of Aquila last April and the false promise of housing for the victims.



What the trailer doesn't seem to show is the movie's focus on the rehousing of the victims and it's role in bumping Silvio Berlusconi's approval ratings which in turn allowed him to extend his power into what one victim in the movie called a "shit dictatorship". Quite interesting to think of the architecture and its role in the exploitation of disaster relief.

Disaster exploitation is explored in detail in the book "The Shock Doctrine" by Naomi Klein which you can check out here as well as slightly touched on in "The Tsunami Box" by Gerald Melling. As designers I think at some point we may feel the desire to become involved in some sort of disaster relief or some sort of humanitarian effort, and I think this is something we should be aware of.

Unfortunately Draquila is no longer playing at the film festival, but be on the look for it at a video store in the months to come.