"Italian cinema is in mortal danger!" complains a director. There is a dispute in the film industry with Giorgia Meloni.

The death of cinema is evident at every turn in Rome. There's the Fiamma, not far from the legendary Via Veneto promenade. The cinema has been closed since 2017. As is so often the case in the Italian capital, decline followed immediately. Where homeless people now set up their night camp, Federico Fellini's masterpiece "La dolce vita" premiered in 1960.

The Fiamma is a symbol of the golden age of Italian cinema. From here, the Dolce Vita feeling began an international career: It became a sales-promoting trademark for many Italian companies as they conquered global markets. In Piazza San Lorenzo in Lucina, near the Spanish Steps, Roman cinephiles met in the stucco-decorated halls of the Étoile. Today, the well-to-do shop here at Louis Vuitton.

For film lovers, the Étoile was "the most important cinema in Rome," says writer Melania Mazzucco on a tour of the former artists' quarter at the foot of Pincio Hill. But the citizens lost the battle to preserve the cinema. "Culture has never been of any value to governments in Italy," says the Roman, now gazing into the shop windows of the French luxury label that opened a glamorous store here in 2012.

Across the Tiber, in the popular nightlife district of Trastevere, the broken glass and graffiti-covered walls of the Cinema Roma present a depressing sight. "The cinema has become a latrine," wrote popular Roman actor and director Carlo Verdone in a post that went viral in January. A Dutch investor had just secured access to the Cinema Roma and eight other Roman cinemas at a foreclosure auction. "The city is degenerating into a culinary destination," Verdone lamented.

Indeed, Rome has transformed from a cultural center into a gigantic fast-food hotspot. Uncontrolled mass tourism is literally devouring the city. People travel to eat, especially to Italy. New all-you-can-eat restaurants like "Senza fondo" on Via Teatro della Pace, directly behind Piazza Navona, are satisfying the growing demand. "Bottomless" – the name itself says it all.

In the past 15 years, 103 cinemas have closed in Italy's film capital. This demise occurred mostly silently. 46 cinemas still stand empty today. The others have already been converted into gambling dens or discotheques, supermarkets, fitness studios, or food halls.

Yet Rome was once known as "Hollywood on the Tiber." It wasn't just the city with the most cinemas in the country—more than 200. Thousands of films were shot at the Cinecittà film studios in southern Rome. Classics like "Ben-Hur" and "Quo Vadis?", spaghetti westerns like "Once Upon a Time in the West" and "A Fistful of Dollars." Fellini had the Via Veneto recreated here for "La Dolce Vita." Francis Ford Coppola shot "The Godfather Part III," Anthony Minghella shot scenes from "The English Patient," and Martin Scorsese filmed "Gangs of New York."

Now, however, the cinema crisis has given the government of the Lazio region an idea: It wants to facilitate the conversion of closed cinemas to attract potential investors. Francesco Rocca, the right-wing regional governor, set out to accelerate the conversion by relaxing existing regulations. This move, a party colleague of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, triggered a storm of protest.

Italian filmmakers, major American directors, and personalities such as star architect Renzo Piano and Rome's football idol Francesco Totti are mobilizing against the plan. The outcry is directed against a draft urban planning law. It would allow the complete conversion not only of cinemas that have been closed for years, but also of those still operating after certain deadlines. Critics fear that the new regulations will turn cinemas into objects of speculation and open the door to their conversion.

In an open letter, Renzo Piano warned: "These properties are the last remaining open spaces in our cities, which are oversaturated with cars, shopping malls, hotels, and tourist apartments." From abroad, Martin Scorsese, Jane Campion, Francis Ford Coppola, Wes Anderson, and George Lucas addressed an appeal to Italian President Sergio Mattarella to protect Rome's cultural spaces.

The wave of outrage had an impact. The regional government dropped some of the relaxations. However, when it recently submitted the draft of the new spatial planning law to the regional parliament, the legislative office rejected it due to constitutional concerns and incompatibility with existing legislation. Rocca then announced new amendments.

But the decline in cinemas is only one aspect of the profound crisis facing Italian film. Production virtually came to a standstill in early 2024. Seventy percent of filmmakers in Italy have been unemployed for more than a year. "The situation is desperate; Italian cinema is in mortal danger," warned film director Pupi Avati.

The moribund industry blames the government for its plight. It allegedly completely cut off funding for film producers a year ago and has since delayed the long-overdue reform of state film funding. This concerns tax breaks that have spurred the growth of the Italian film industry since 2016 and attracted many foreign productions. The Ministry of Culture has failed to revise the law.

Instead, a heated exchange erupted over the crisis in Italian film between Culture Minister Alessandro Giuli and individual filmmakers who had criticized the government. Giuli hurled insults at actor Elio Germano and satirist Geppi Cucciari. This is typical of the climate in Italian cultural policy. Anyone who addresses the plight of the film industry today is entering political battleground.

Almost three years ago, Giorgia Meloni, according to her own statement, set out to end the cultural hegemony of the left in Italy. In a recent video interview with the newspaper "La Verità," Meloni explained that there were no actors in the country who publicly declared their right-wing views: "Behind this lies the clan-like behavior of the left."

The head of government also weighed in on the dispute over film funding. "I'm not throwing people's money out the window to finance things that aren't worth it," she said. The government wants to make subsidies dependent on a film project's commercial prospects in the future. She also wants to promote films that celebrate Italy and portray Italians in a positive light. Elio Germano, who recently won the David di Donatello Award for his leading role in the biopic "Berlinguer - La grande ambizione," asks: "Is it the job of cinema to promote the country?"