DiSalvo was head animator on Disney’s Oscar-winning “Frozen.”
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‘Frozen’ Animator Lino DiSalvo Taps Into ‘Awesome, Superstitious, Loving, Wonderful’ Italian Roots With Coming-of-Age Tale ‘Twisted’
“Frozen” head animator and longtime Disney veteran Lino DiSalvo is developing an animated feature that tells the coming-of-age story of an Italian teenager who teams up with a mythical beast to save her hometown from an evil curse.
Written by Kissy Dugan and produced by Emmanuel Jacomet for Mediawan Kids & Family with Italy’s Palomar Animation, “Twisted” is among the buzzy projects being pitched this week at Rome’s MIA Market, which runs Oct. 14 – 18.
Inspired by the tall tales DiSalvo heard growing up in an Italian American household in Brooklyn, the story is based on a holiday ritual in the Italian town of Andrista, where villagers perform an annual rite to mark the Feast of the Epiphany by hunting and capturing a mythical beast known as the Badalisc.
Describing what he hopes will be “a fun, big movie” as “super silly with tons of heart,” DiSalvo said: “I just want to bring my awesome, superstitious, loving, wonderful, rich history of growing up Italian to the big screen.”
“Twisted” begins in a small town in the Valcamonica valley in Lombardy, where for centuries the villagers have gathered on the eve of the Epiphany to hunt the Badalisc, a mythical, horned creature dwelling in the forests of the Alpine region. Once captured, the beast is paraded through the town, where he exposes secrets, gossip and petty grievances — a ritual that returns the community to peace and harmony for another year.
In DiSalvo’s telling, however, the tradition takes an unexpected turn. “Our movie picks up where everyone has gotten so sick of this guy revealing everyone’s secrets every year that they kick him out of the town,” he said. “This poor creature! He’s been the star of the show for hundreds of years, and…they banish him from the town.”
The Badalisc’s only crime is doing the one thing that comes naturally to him: telling the truth. “In his heart, all he wants to do…is be part of the community.”
Enter Angelina, a smooth-talking teen who works in the family pizzeria. “Her family has this expectation [that] she’s going to be the next prime minister, she’s going to be a fashion designer — things that Italian families want for you to ‘succeed,’” said DiSalvo. “The irony is that all she wants to do is make pizza.”
Unlike the truth-telling Badalisc, Angelina proceeds from the “flawed philosophy” that “it’s just easier to tell people what they want to hear.” “She basically lies to everybody,” said DiSalvo. As the plot kicks into motion, the young hero — with some help from the banished beast — will eventually be called upon to save the people of Andrista, a quest that gives rise to the central tension of the film: “Is it ever right to lie? Should you always be truthful, even if it means hurting someone?”
Now based in Montreal, the Brooklyn native drew heavily on memories from his childhood while developing “Twisted.” “I grew up in a family that had a pizzeria. All my life experiences took place in that pizzeria. It’s the lens that I viewed the world through,” he said. “Being a first-generation Italian American and belonging to a family that was traditional but also interestingly modern in their take, they had expectations for me. I was going to be the first DiSalvo not to make pizza.”
His success since then would do any Italian grandma proud. Recruited at the age of 20, DiSalvo spent 16 years at Walt Disney Animation Studios, where he served as head of animation on the Academy Award-winning film “Frozen” and worked as a supervising animator on projects including “Tangled” and “Bolt.” After leaving Disney, he served as creative director for Paramount Animation and later as the head of creative at ON Animation Studios in Paris. More recently, he directed and produced the Emmy-nominated Christmas special “Reindeer in Here” for CBS Studios and Paramount+.
For “Twisted,” he’ll join forces with Paris-based powerhouse Mediawan Kids & Family, which in the past year has been growing its slate of prestige animation.
“Ever since I mentioned it to them, Emmanuel Jacomet, the producer there, he’s been championing the project,” said DiSalvo. “He’s believed in it. The leadership there believes in it. Then they started giving me resources to put together writers and…bring my wish list to fruition.”
Early returns have been encouraging, with the animator and his Mediawan partners presenting “Twisted” earlier this year to industry audiences at Annecy and Cartoon Movie in Bordeaux.
“After we showed this proof of concept, the response from the industry has been awesome,” DiSalvo said. “It really warms my heart that theatrical distribution in Europe and South America, there’s a hunger for these personal stories that still feel fantastical and silly and comedic and action-based, told with a very specific point of view.”
Pope Leo XIV left the Canary Islands for Rome on Friday in a Falcon plane offered by Spanish King Felipe VI after his original aircraft suffered a technical glitch, according to reporters at the scene.
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The flight took off just after 6:00 pm and is expected to arrive in Rome at around 11:00 pm. The pope wrapped up a week-long visit to Spain on Friday.
The pontiff’s departure from Tenerife was delayed earlier on Friday by a technical problem with the plane which led him to disembark, according to an AFP reporter at the scene.
Spain’s King Felipe VI, who had just said goodbye to the pontiff on the runway, boarded the Iberia airline plane and both disembarked and returned to the terminal.
About 80 journalists remained on the jet, along with Vatican officials and members of the clergy.
“The departure of the papal flight has been delayed by half an hour due to a technical problem with the aircraft,” the communications service for the papal trip in Spain said in a brief statement.
The pilot initially told passengers there was a technical fault but later specified a “startup failure of the engine,” which he said was likely caused by wind conditions.
“Our maintenance team suggests towing the aircraft, positioning it into the wind, and attempting a new engine start,” the pilot told those on board.
“We will try this. If it is successful, we can depart.”
The glitch marked an unusual end to an otherwise successful trip to Madrid, Barcelona and the Canary Islands.
Pope Leo XIV pressed his migration message and also inaugurated the new tower of the Sagrada Familia basilica.
It was the first time in decades that a papal flight had experienced a problem so serious that it required the pope to change planes.
Veteran Vatican reporters, some of whom were on the Iberia plane, recalled a few plane-related incidents during the pontificate of St. John Paul II.
During a 1986 return trip from India, John Paul II’s plane was forced to land in Naples because of a snowstorm in Rome. The passengers and pope took a special train back to Rome.
In 1988 en route to Lesotho, bad weather forced the late pope’s plane to land in South Africa, a country he had excluded from his African trip at the time because of apartheid. He was later driven into the kingdom.
Typically on papal trips, the Italian national carrier ITA Airways brings the pope to his destination and that country’s national carrier brings him home, with ITA sometimes doing the round trip if the voyage is particularly long or to a place that doesn’t have the capacity.
The flights are charters, with the pope, Vatican delegation and security occupying the front of the plane and the 70 or so journalists seated in coach.
Iberia had proudly provided video earlier in the trip of Pope Leo XIV seated in the cockpit, smiling broadly as the plane carried him from Madrid to Barcelona and then Barcelona to the Canary Islands.
In both cases, Spanish military aircraft provided an airborne escort, a sign of respect for visiting dignitaries and in one clip of the video the pope is seen waving to the escorting pilot.
Additional sources • AP, AFP
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War, latest news. Trump: agreement with Iran to be signed soon. Tehran media: approval likely from top officials
Oxfam: ‘Over 540 settler attacks in the West Bank in the first few months of 2026’
A new analysis by Oxfam highlights the exponential rise in attacks by Israeli settlers and military forces in the occupied West Bank: in the first few months of 2026 alone, there were over 540 incidents and “in three years, the number of Palestinian civilians killed has exceeded that of the previous 17 years”, mainly children. According to the report, based on an analysis of data provided by the United Nations, “it is clear that Israel’s annexation plan is accelerating, with mass forced displacements, increased restrictions on Palestinians’ freedom of movement and an unprecedented escalation of violence by settlers and the army”. A plan of ethnic cleansing and annexation that, since 2023, has caused over 46,000 people to be displaced, the construction of over 925 barriers that impede the movement of 3 million people, and an unprecedented wave of violence that has claimed over 1,200 lives, including nearly 270 children. In particular, between 2006 and 2022, Oxfam points out, there were 1,036 victims, including 225 children, whilst since 2023 alone, 1,244 have been recorded, with 268 children killed. This means that, over the last 20 years, one in five killings involved a child, around 22 per cent. By contrast, in the first 17 years under review, 86 Israeli settlers were killed by Palestinians, including 12 children, whilst there were 43 victims, including 10 children, between 2023 and 2025. “The massacre of civilians we are witnessing is painful and disturbing,” said Paolo Pezzati, spokesperson for humanitarian crises at Oxfam Italia – “Whilst the eyes of the world were rightly focused on the genocide committed by Israel in Gaza, following the atrocities committed by Hamas and other armed groups in 2023, an unprecedented wave of violence was unfolding across the West Bank, which has now escalated into a systematic plan of ethnic cleansing. In this context, we are therefore launching an urgent appeal for all necessary diplomatic pressure to be brought to bear on Israel to halt the ongoing annexation plan,” concludes Pezzati.
US: third Iranian oil tanker breaching the blockade neutralised
The US Central Command stated on X that it had intercepted an oil tanker, the third in a week, accused of violating the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. US Central Command says it struck the M/T Jalveer, flying the flag of Guinea-Bissau, “as it attempted to transport oil from Iran through the Gulf of Oman”. “A US aircraft fired two Hellfire missiles at the ship’s engine room after the crew repeatedly refused to obey orders from US forces,” Centcom said.
Meloni: the Council should reflect on the direction of relations between the EU and Israel
“Not only because of what is happening in Lebanon, but also given the situation in Gaza and the West Bank, it is clear that the European Council will need to reflect on the direction of relations between the European Union and Israel.” This was stated by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni in the Chamber of Deputies, in her address ahead of the EU Council meeting. “On this,” she added, “I would like, for once, to see a debate here that goes beyond the emphasis on facile polemics, which certainly yields an immediate return in terms of visibility, but does not reflect the strategic importance that the issue holds for Italia.”
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Former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol sentenced to 30 years over North Korea drone flights
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A South Korean court sentenced former President Yoon Suk Yeol to 30 years in prison Friday in a case that accused him of ordering drone flights over North Korea in an effort to justify his declaration of martial law.
Yoon, 65, was sentenced alongside former Defense Minister Kim Yong Hyun by the Seoul Central District Court.
The ousted president was previously sentenced to life in prison for leading an insurrection following his declaration of martial law in December 2024.
North Korea accused South Korea of flying drones over Pyongyang to drop propaganda leaflets on three occasions in October 2024.
SOUTH KOREAN LAWMAKERS SUPPORT SUSPENDING PRESIDENT’S POWERS AFTER SHORT-LIVED MARTIAL LAW DECLARATION
South Korea’s impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol attends a hearing of his impeachment trial at the Constitutional Court in Seoul on Feb. 11, 2025. (Lee Jin-man/AP)
Then-Defense Minister Kim initially issued a vague denial before South Korea’s Defense Ministry said it could neither confirm nor deny the allegations.
Although tensions between the two Koreas escalated following the incident, the drone flights did not lead to any military clashes.
Prosecutors accused Yoon of attempting to create a crisis with North Korea while plotting an authoritarian power grab aimed at removing political opponents and consolidating control.
SOUTH KOREAN COURT RULES EX‑PRESIDENT YOON SUK YEOL GUILTY IN INSURRECTION TRIAL
Supporters of former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol stage a rally outside the Seoul High Court in Seoul on April 29, 2026. (Ahn Young-joon/AP)
Before declaring martial law, Yoon delivered a televised address accusing liberal lawmakers of sympathizing with North Korea.
Yoon has argued that he possessed the constitutional authority to declare martial law and said the move was intended to draw attention to what he viewed as obstruction by opposition parties.
His attempt to impose martial law lasted roughly six hours before lawmakers voted to overturn it amid mass public protests.
Yoon was arrested in July 2025 and continues to face multiple criminal proceedings.
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South Korea’s ousted former President Yoon Suk Yeol arrives at Seoul Central District Court in Seoul to attend his trial on charges related to declaring martial law on Dec. 3, 2025. (Ahn Young-joon/AP)
The insurrection verdict has been appealed by both Yoon and prosecutors, who had sought the death penalty.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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