IL CAMMINO
THE PATH
Giovanni Montagnana / Italy / 2025 / 30 min / Colour
European premiere
On April 27, 1945, on the border between the Veronese and Trentino mountains in Eastern Lessinia, Don Domenico Mercante, the parish priest of the small village of Giazza, and Leonhard Dallasega, a South Tyrolean soldier conscripted into the German army, were killed under circumstances that remain unclear to this day. Eighty years later, two young men from Verona, Davide and Cristian, undertake a hike to retrace that same route—from Giazza, in the upper Illasi Valley, across Passo Pertica, and down through the Valle dei Ronchi to Ala. Their journey and reflections intersect with the testimonies of historians and researchers, visits to the locations, the analysis of the few available documents, and numerous oral histories. Their “path” becomes a ritual of remembrance—an opportunity to question the meaning of truth, and an attempt to give a name to forgotten stories.
Giovanni Montagnana
He earned a degree in Cinema from DAMS in Bologna and in Creativity and Communication Design from IUSVE in Venice. He works on commercial video productions and personal film projects. His short Heimat (2021) won the Zavattini Prize and received recognition at the Venice Film Week, the Tehran International Short Film Festival, and DocBerlin Documentary Film Festival.
