The film:

Guido Piacenza, as his brother Mario, was a clever entrepreneur, driven, both by the business sense and by a strong adventure spirit. In 1912 he organized an expedition to Belgian Congo, considering to arrive to Matadi and reach Uganda going up the river Congo. With him there was his friend Neri, a doctor based in Congo, expert in the sleeping sickness.

During the trip, Guido Piacenza brought the movie camera and some negative film stock with himself, in order to document some of the most characteristic aspects of that country. At a first research, the images shot by Piacenza seem to be the most antique scenes of that area.

Some important stopovers were documented by Piacenza himself, who also left, as a testimony of the entire expedition, a manuscript diary, that is now conserved at the Fondazione Famiglia Piacenza  di Pollone.

At that time the film wasn’t edited, but it was safeguarded by the family who then entrusted to Museo Nazionale del Cinema. The information contained in the diary have permitted to determine a chronologic order to the editing. The manuscript has also been the source of the intertitles inserted in the film, edited with the contribution of the Laboratorio di Antropologia Visiva del Dipartimento Culture, Politiche e Società dell'Università di Torino.

The film restoration:

The restoration of Viaggio in Congo was carried out by Museo Nazionale del Cinema di Torino and it was based on a negative nitrate 800 meter-long, belonging to the Museo’s collection. Special acknowledgments for their contributions to the Museo Nazionale della Montagna “Duca degli Abruzzi” di Torino; Fondazione Famiglia Piacenza di Pollone; Laboratorio di Antropologia Visiva del Dipartimento Culture, Politiche e Società dell'Università di Torino.

The restoration works were carried out in 2013 at the L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory in Bologna.

Link Vimeo Cineteca MNC:

https://vimeo.com/180175862

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