Film 'Stardust' on Architects Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown Premieres at Rome Film Fest

The documentary 'Stardust,' directed by Jim Venturi and written and edited by Anita Naughton, premiered at the Festa del Cinema di Roma on October 16-17, 2025. The film focuses on architects Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown, known for their groundbreaking work including the Sainsbury Wing of the National Gallery in London and influential texts like 'Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture' and 'Learning from Las Vegas.' They challenged Modernism by embracing elements considered vulgar by the elite, such as neon signs, shopping malls, and suburbs. Jim Venturi, their son, intended the film not as a family story but as a record for future generations, capturing his parents while they were alive and active. Naughton transformed it into an intimate love story and manifesto, intertwining archival materials and everyday life footage collected over more than ten years. The film explores their rebellious approach to architecture, using Las Vegas as a lens to understand the American urban environment without designing in its style. Robert Venturi, of Italian descent with roots in Abruzzo and Puglia, studied in Rome in the 1950s on a Rome Prize but never built in Italy, a lifelong regret. The film is presented as a love letter and a manifesto, aiming to be experienced like a fiction film rather than a documentary. Jim Venturi hopes audiences see life through his parents' eyes, as brilliant, eccentric, and witty characters.