Francesco Godina

In 1909, four fearless entrepreneurs and then-unknown Irish writer James Joyce met in Trieste, the main port of the Austro-Hungarian empire, where he convinced them to expand their cinema business and invest in the opening of Ireland's first full time cinema. The Cinema Volta is not a historical documentary about the opening of a landmark cinema, but a light, spirited and modern personal search for the spirit of the people involved.

Italo Svevo (real name Ettore Schmitz) was born in Trieste in 1861 and was almost overlooked as a writer during his lifetime. It was only with his novel "La Coscienza di Zeno" ("Zeno's Conscience") in 1923 that he achieved his breakthrough. The modernity of the work fascinated his friend James Joyce (1882-1941), who then opened the doors to the literary Paris of the 1920s for him.