Art, Music & Film
Silent films meet live music in Pordenone
Italy's 45th silent film festival (October 3–10, 2026) showed 250 old films with live music and Japanese benshi narrators.
The 45th Pordenone Silent Film Festival took place in northern Italy from October 3 to 10, 2026. Over eight days, it showed 250 short and long films from 67 film archives in 19 countries. The main venue was the Teatro Verdi in Pordenone, and a selection of films was also shown online every day.
Silent films were made before movies had recorded sound, so the actors' words often appeared as text on the screen. But the screenings in Pordenone are not really silent, because musicians play live music while the films run. The festival has its own team of twelve musicians, and other musicians and orchestras joined them this year. The first festival took place in 1982, and today it welcomes film experts, students and fans from around the world.
Word in this story
A person who tells a story, for example someone who describes what is happening in a film.
It was narrated by a benshi, a live narrator who tells the story of a silent film to the audience.