Many of these productions have been chosen and awarded in both Italian and international festivals. Among the created documentaries, The Big Question was produced by Mel Gibson and released in American cinemas by ThinkFilm in 2006, becoming the first Italian feature film documentary distributed in American movie theatres. “The Akram Khan”, a documentary on choreographer Akram Khan, wins Moving Frames FF in Hong Kong and the Dhaka FF. “Marocco Fantasia” fallows Al Di Meola return in his unforgettable concert at the Mawazine festival in Rabat. “Una grande fortuna” produced by Eagle Pictures, is a musical in between a fiction and a documentary that will open 20th Torino Festival. “Il Compromesso” on Michelagelo’s Moses wins as best RAI art documentary of the decade at 64th Prix Italia Torino.
Francesco Cabras, alone or with Molinari, is the director of Vasco Brondi, Nada, Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio, Max Gazzè, Caparezza, Sergio Cammariere, Giorgia, Roberto Angelini, and many others’ music videos He shoots, for La7, two monographic episodes about India. He directs for Fox Cult TV a cycle of videoart, among which “Paleoliche” that wins the Festarte contest and includes Cabras in Young Blood, the Italian talents awarded around the world annuary. This work has been used by Greenpeace for the national pro-wind power campaign. “Gente che conta” is another videoart cycle that is taken by the Contemporary Art Center of Luigi Pecci in Prato and is inserted in the retrospective “La via sperimentale del cinema italiano” for the 49th “Mostra Internazionale del Nuovo Cinema” in Pesaro. Cabras and Molinari directed for theatre and created the videoart installation of Andrea Parodi’s work Terracuzzatò at the theatre Lirico in Cagliari with the singer Noa.
As director and director of photography he realizes humanitarian and environmental campaigns for Greenpeace and for NGOs Terre des Hommes, Amref, Medreact, Legambiente, Un Ponte per Baghdad, Light House Foundation and for UN agency IFAD. For Medreact, with Alberto Molinari, he realizes two documentaries about sustainable phishing in the Mediterranean that were chosen in 23 environmental movie festivals.
In 2011, after having suspended for a few years commissioned photography to concentrate on directing, Francesco Cabras picks up again full time a purely authorial photographic journey. His work now is focused on new projects and on creating an archive. He participates at the artist residences of Bocs art in Cosenza and at Endecameron Incubatio in Rocca Sinibalda, realizing circumstantial works. He starts to cooperate with the Raffaella De Chirico Gallery in Turin, with the Crossroad Gallery in Capalbio, with the AXRT in Avellino, with the De Chirico & Udovich ConTeporary Art and with the Mediterranea in Naples. He exhibited in individual shows in Italy and abroad.
In 2016 the individual show Urban Icons at Castel dell’Ovo in Naples, in 2017 he exhibits at Maxxi in Rome for Amref 50th anniversary.
In 2018 a group exhibition at Lia Rumma’s gallery in Naples for PianoTerra and another one at the Arles Festival. Two other individual shows have been realized in Turin, Rome, Berlin, Bruxelles, Paris, Capalbio, Milan, Bologna, Pisa, Lecce, Spoleto and Sestri Levante.
As a performer he wins best leading actor at the Nanni Moretti Sacher Festival in 1997. He participates at The Passion of the Christ by Mel Gibson in the role of Gesmas, he acts in Captain Corelli’s Mandolin by John Madden, on which set he is the director of the documentary “Italian Soldiers” chosen by IDFA in Amsterdam and winner of the LAIFA Los Angeles Italian Film Festival. He participates in the role of the rebels’ leader in Equilibrium by Kurt Wimmer and is the main character of the Rasputin by Louis Nero.
His fairy tale “L’Isola della Quorina” wins the Andersen Baia of Fairytales international literary prize and the Bruce Chatwin prize. He is co-author of India, Amsterdam and Birmania tourist guides. He is the author of a chapter for the book “Tommy The Who”.
He is the author of songs including the triple platinum song “Tre parole” by Valeria Rossi of which he writes the refrain lyrics. He is the North Sentinel singer with which he records the homonymous album.
