How Venice Quietly Became Part of a Story
Every September, I return to Venice.
Not because I expect to find the same city waiting for me, but because I know it won’t.
For five consecutive years, I have followed almost the same ritual. After a day on the Lido, surrounded by screenings, conversations and the energy of the Venice Film Festival, I board the vaporetto back across the lagoon. Somewhere between the festival and the city, the rhythm changes. The conversations fade into the sound of the water, and by the time I step ashore, I have already left the day behind.
Only then do I begin to walk.
I never walk with a destination in mind. Venice has taught me that stories rarely appear when you go looking for them. They reveal themselves when you allow yourself to wander without expectations.
Looking back, I realise that the film came later.
The walks came first.
Hugo Teugels
There are places that impress you immediately.
Venice didn’t.
It stayed with me instead.
Not through its famous landmarks, but through moments that seemed almost insignificant at the time.
There was a stone lion I found myself greeting almost every year. I never planned to stop there, yet somehow I usually did. It became less a landmark than a quiet companion on my journey.
Then there was something even smaller.
For years, a small golden spoon had occupied a corner of my imagination. Long before it became part of The Cassandra Venice Project, I had brought it with me from Spain without knowing exactly why. Only later, over a simple coffee on Piazza San Marco, did it finally find its place.
That is how Venice works.
It rarely announces its influence.
It simply leaves traces behind.
People often ask where The Cassandra Venice Project began.
The honest answer is that I don’t know.
It certainly wasn’t the moment I opened a blank page.
It might have been on a bridge.
Or in an empty square after midnight.
Or while watching old buildings dissolve into the reflections of the lagoon.
Looking back, I don’t think I invented the story.
I simply kept walking until I recognised it.
The project gradually revealed itself through fragments: a city suspended between beauty and fragility, water that gives life while threatening to take it away, myths that suddenly felt contemporary, and silence that often spoke louder than dialogue.
The duality that has always fascinated me as a filmmaker naturally found its home here. Blue and red. Hope and warning. Creation and destruction. Reality and imagination.
Venice stopped being a setting.
It became part of my storytelling.
As the project evolved, another image quietly returned.
A paper boat.
Small and fragile, it eventually found its place in the hands of Navina, the child at the heart of When Cassandra Venice Speaks. She became a reminder that every generation inherits both the beauty we preserve and the consequences of what we ignore.
Perhaps the paper boat had been waiting for her all along.
Looking back, I realise that When Cassandra Venice Speaks was never simply another film. It became the moment when years of walks, memories and scattered ideas quietly recognised one another.
Not an ending.
Just another step in the conversation.
Each September reminds me that Venice changes very little.
I do.
Every visit brings different questions, new ideas and unexpected perspectives. The streets remain remarkably patient, as though they know there is no need to hurry the process.
Perhaps that is why I have never thought of Venice as merely a location.
It has become a creative partner.
A place that doesn’t offer answers, but asks better questions.
Another September is approaching.
Soon, I will once again board the vaporetto, cross the lagoon and step back into those familiar streets.
I already know the bridges.
I already know the narrow passages.
I already know the direction.
Yet I have absolutely no idea where the next walk will lead.
And perhaps…
that is exactly why I keep returning.
— Hugo Teugels
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Filmmakerlife Magazine Hugo Teugels Isuue 127
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Marcel Padriano is a film analyst and writer with a focus on marketing, distribution, and the independent film circuit. His work blends industry knowledge with a sharp understanding of global trends, making his articles a valuable resource for filmmakers, producers, and creatives navigating today’s evolving cinematic landscape.
