Michelangelo Antonioni’s masterpiece Blow-Up is fifty-years-old. This documentary reconstructs, through interviews, the director’s journey through London during the making of his film in 1966.
Among those interviewed is Antonioni’s ex-dialogue assistant Piers Haggard, in his first experience with the cinema before becoming a prolific director himself; the photographer David Montgomery, celebrated for his photos of rock legends like The Who, The Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix, whose studio Antonio visited to witness first-hand the techniques of fashion photography; and Jill Kennington, one of the most frequently photographed models on the London scene, who took part in one of Blow-up’s most famous scenes.
Several protagonists of Sixties London’s counterculture also participate, including the writer Barry Miles, who founded the bookshop-gallery Indica and the underground newspaper "International Times"; Clare Peploe, Antonioni’s friend at the time and later a director and screenwriter in her own right; and Simon Napier-Bell, the former manager of The Yardbirds, the band that appears in the film. Then there are scholars, collectors and true fans of the film, who in recent years have uncovered important details about its making.
The documentary also revisits the film’s principal locations, including the studio where the scenes with the models were shot, and the park in which the famous photography sequence with David Hemmings and Vanessa Redgrave and the final tennis match took place. All these are brought back to life through the beautiful on-set photographs preserved in the Fondo Antonioni.

Film screening followed by Q&A with director Valentina Agostinis.
Valentina Agostinis is a journalist and has written on culture for various newspapers and RAI TV.