Cinema Paradiso director Giuseppe Tornatore to shoot next film in UK

Cinema Paradiso writer-director Giuseppe Tornatore is due to shoot his next film in the UK from May.

Romantic drama The Correspondence, the director’s first film to shoot in the UK, will follow the love affair between a professor and a younger woman working in the same field.

The film will reunite many of the collaborators on Tornatore’s latest effort The Best Offer, including regular collaborator Ennio Morricone, producer Paco Cinematografica, distributor-producer Warner Bros’ Italy and sales outfit uMedia International.

The director has been in Scotland this week scouting locations for the film, which is due to shoot in Edinburgh, York and parts of Yorkshire before finishing shoot in Italy.

Casting is being kept under wraps with a “well-known” male lead close to signing on.

Warner Bros Italy is due to release the film on January 1, 2015, the same date it released Tornatore’s 2013 drama The Best Offer, which grossed $12m in the territory.

That film, about a master auctioneer (Geoffrey Rush) who becomes obsessed with a reclusive heiress, won six David Di Donatello Awards, including Best Film, Best Director and Best Music.

The Correspondence will be the second of Rome-based Paco Cinematografica ’s three-film deal with the director.