An enormous Renaissance square that can accommodate over 8,000 viewers every night, the Piazza is both the Festival’s heart and its showcase. With its giant screen, one of the biggest in the world, endowed with truly exceptional projection quality, the Piazza is one of the finest cinemas in Europe, and open-air to boot.
Seating Capacity : 8,000
Classic Cinema (16 & 35mm)
Electronic Cinema (Standard Definition – Video)
Digital Cinema (High Definition)
Piazza Grande screening technologies
Classic Cinema / 35mm film
35 mm screen ratio 1:1,37 / 1,66 / 1,85 / 2,35
Dual projectors with change-overs
Light output : 7'000 WATTS
Digital Cinema
High Definition : XDC SERVER - HDCAM
Standard Definition : DIGITAL BETA - BETA SP PAL
Brightness : 27'000 ANSI/LUMEN
SOUND (5.1)
Analog and digital sound (DOLBY - SDDS - DTS)
Soundsystem : Active Crossovers - Multichannel with digital delays
(Studio specifications)
The projection booth
In 1971, architect Livio Vacchini, with support from Raimondo Rezzonico, developed the «Festival cinema» project for Locarno’s Piazza Grande. The ensemble displayed a fine structural coherence: a screen, a projection booth and a thousand seats. An almost militant construction in its choice of materials and forms.
The original projection booth drew attention for its unconventional form, its skeleton and its roughness, due to its being made from two polyester swimming pool shells. Attracting children to play around it during the day, as soon as night falls this strange edifice starts humming with activity, and in case of sudden rain becomes an improvised shelter for members of the audience. After numerous migrations over successive editions of the Festivals this UFO on its imaginary launch pad began to shown signs of wear and tear.
In 1990 a new booth replaced the initial one, designed by architect Rolando Ulmi, who kept faith with the spirit of the original by retaining its fossil-like and aerial aspects. The booth has welcomed numerous filmmakers who climbed aboard to watch, in wonderment, as their film was projected to the audience. Among others, Youssef Chahine, Daniel Schmid, Aki Kaurismäki, Paul Schrader, Alain Tanner, Abbas Kiarostami, Paul Verhoeven, were all moved to make compliments or simply smile in complicity.
With projection systems becoming more sophisticated, a more generous and adequate space was required. With this in mind the engineer Alessandro Bonalumi created the 2007 version of the booth. The smooth exterior was custom built, but this more ergonomically designed booth still retains the enduring and legendary silhouette.
Patricia Boillat, Image & sound supervisor
28.07.2008 | Locarno Dailies's blog
Cat. : 5.1 surround sound Abbas Kiarostami Aki Kaurismäki Alain Tanner Alessandro Bonalumi Ambiance Beta CDATA DANIEL SCHMID Digital cinema Digital media DTS Entertainment Entertainment Europe Film Livio Vacchini locarno Movie theater Patricia Boillat Paul Schrader Paul Verhoeven piazza gande Projection booth Projectors Rolando Ulmi Sony Dynamic Digital Sound Surround sound Technology XDC Youssef Chahine