The work of archaeologists is both precious and mysterious. By digging to discover wonders of the past, these researchers expose fragments of an ancient world, scraps of vanished civilizations to make us dream. And forget the present…
At least this is the reality of the characters in The Chimera, a group of Etruscan grave robbers. Characters both zany and cruel, marginalized people fleeing the reality of their society and their time: industrial Italy in the 1980s.
The Chimera, by Alice Rohrwacher, is a modern and fascinating tale about the quest of Arthur (Josh O’Connor), a damaged young archaeologist. With great formal freedom, the Italian director and screenwriter tells the funny odyssey of this group of grave robbers who sell these rare objects on the black market to survive.
Freed from prison for his illicit activities, Arthur returns, at the beginning of the film, to a village on the Tyrrhenian Sea. There, the merry bandits are impatiently waiting for him. They want the young man to return to service, because he has a gift: he is a medium who feels the void under the earth and can find where archaeological wonders are buried!
The film was selected at the last Cannes Film Festival. In addition to the original style of Alice Rohrwacher, we must highlight the work of the director of photography, Hélène Louvart. We filmed in 35mm, Super 16 and 16mm. The photo gives an ancient grain to the images which also seem to belong to the past.
Rohrwacher’s staging evokes the magic of Fellini (the carnival in the village), then borrows the music of Mozart (the scene where treasures buried under a shipyard are unearthed, in the middle of a landscape of cranes and containers). The emptiness that Arthur feels also echoes our post-industrial world, the pollution and destruction of our ecosystem. As if humans were condemned to enrich themselves by killing the beauty of the world.
The very solid Josh O’Connor (The Crown, God’s Own Country) finds (another) role commensurate with his immense talent. In fact, the entire cast excels in this beautiful and touching film, despite some lengths. Mention to Carol Duarte and Isabella Rosellini, in a small role.
“Perhaps if the Etruscans were still here, there wouldn’t have been this machismo in Italy,” says Melodie, collaborator of Spartaco (Alba Rohrwacher), leader of the artifact traffickers, in the middle of the story. Perhaps our contemporaries could learn a thing or two from vanished civilizations… instead of plundering them.
The film is presented in the original version with English subtitles.
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Drama
The Chimera
Alice Rohrwacher
With Josh O’Connor, Carol Duarte, Isabelle Rossellini, Lou Roy-Lecollinet
2:10 a.m.