The Lost Italian Cinema Audience is a project that addresses the need to investigate the cinema-going audiences of the 40s and 50s. It aims to construct their profile: socio-demographic characteristics, values, tastes, and habits of cultural consumption in a period of great interest from the point of view of cinema’s evolution in Italy. The universities of Oxford Brookes, Bristol and Exeter are collaborating in a systematic research project on the theme, which will be conducted in several stages using different modes of methodological inquiry. Memoro – the Memory Bank’s role in the project involves the collection of 160 video interviews with people who remember the cinema of the 40s and 50s. In addition to the filmed interviews, the information will be collected via a questionnaire and the incorporation of other materials such as cinema journals from the period, archival research into stars from the period (through diaries and general and specialist archive) and market research carried out by US production companies in Italy. The eight regions upon which the project will focus upon are Tuscany, Lombardy, Emilia Romagna, Lazio, Sicily, Campania, the Veneto, and Basilicata. The research will be set in the context of the socio-economic characteristics of these areas, in particular in the relationship between the centre and the periphery, between industrial and agricultural areas, between North and South etc. Cinema, in its evolution from a marginalized form of entertainment for the lower classes to generator of star systems, is considered, from an historical and sociological point of view, to provide a unique opportunity for insights into social and cultural dynamics. With the arrival of mass modes of communication, in particular radio and television, scholars have developed research that regards individuals as ‘targets of communication’. What has been neglected in this approach has been research into the characteristics, above all qualitative, of the cinema-going public. Below is some information relating to the regions under consideration: Tuscany, Lombardy, Emilia Romagna, Lazio, Sicily, Campania, the Veneto, and Basilicata, to which are added the cities of Bari, Rome, Turin, Milan, Naples, Palermo, Cagliari and Florence, selected from the twelve ‘regional capitals’ used by AGIS (a national body that collects data on the entertainment industry) to monitor box office intake.

The lost Italian Cinema Audience é un progetto che risponde all'esigenza di indagare sul profilo, le caratteristiche socio-demografiche, i valori, i gusti e le abitudini di consumo culturale del pubblico che frequentava le sale cinematografiche italiane negli anni '40 e '50, un periodo di estremo interesse dal punto di vista dello sviluppo di questo media. Le università di Oxford Bookes, di Bristol e di Exeter stanno collaborando ad una ricerca sistematica sul tema che verrà condotta in diverse fasi attraverso tecniche di rilevazione differenziate. Memoro - la Banca della Memoria é coinvolta nel progetto per la parte di raccolta delle 160 video interviste a persone che hanno memoria del cinema degli anni Quaranta e Cinquanta. Il metodo di raccolta di informazioni, oltre alle interviste filmate, prevede un questionario e l'intreccio con altri materiali come riviste cinematografiche del periodo, approfondimenti sui materiali d' archivio delle star del periodo (diari e archivi generali o specialistici) e ricerche di mercato effettuate dalle case di produzione americane in Italia. Toscana, Lombardia, Emilia Romagna, Lazio, Sicilia, Campania, Veneto e Basilicata sono le otto regioni selezionate, con l'intento di esplorare le caratteristiche socio-economiche del paese, ad esempio nei rapporti tra centro e periferia, tra zone principalmente industriali o zone ad economia prevalentemente agricola, nord e sud, ecc.