What Is Left? (2014)

Award-winning filmmakers Luca Ragazzi and Gustav Hofer make a bold and cheeky return to Hot Docs with another timely and autobiographical look at contemporary Italian society. Following their festival and theatrical hit films Suddenly Last Winter (about the travails of a modern gay couple in Italy) and Italy: Love It, or Leave It (about the challenges of living and working under the controversial Silvio Berlusconi) their latest doc takes a decidedly, well, left turn. After the Second World War, Italy was home to the largest Communist (later socialist) party in the West. The party's efforts to enhance social and economic conditions for all Italians earned them remarkable electoral success and influence. Seeking a more equal and progressive Italy, the filmmakers set out to discover why their country has now become so persistently conservative, and what happened to its once proud and vital left-wing sensibilities.