ON THIS PAGE:
- In Viaggio
- When the Waves are Gone
IN VIAGGIO
Venice 79, Out of Competition Italy, 2022 Director: Gianfranco Rosi Running time: 80′
Moved by the desire to tell the world’s emotions through Pope Francis’s eyes, Gianfranco Rosi chose to make In viaggio personally following the Pontiff’s itineraries. The film is a work in progress that the director, Golden Lion winner in 2013 with Sacro GRA (as well as a Golden Bear in 2016 for Fuocoammare), continued to update until the very end. The narrative, made in part of stock footage, composes a sort of Via Crucis of the Pope through the most dramatic issues plaguing the contemporary world. Poverty, immigration, war, environmental emergency- these are the painful stages Francesco wished to cross travelling in person to the countries most affected by these tragedies. Despite his age and uncertain health, in the 9 years of his pontificate, Bergoglio has made 37 trips and visited 59 countries, taking on the same pain, toil and joys of the visited countries. From Italy to Brazil, Cuba, the United States, the African continent, to Southeast Asia, Pope Francis did not want to shy away from his task of witnessing the suffering that afflicts the world, knowing that his presence would not only comfort the people but also give voice and prominence to their tragedies on the world stage. With the same eloquent simplicity of Pope Francis’ gestures and words, the documentary follows his movements, shows what he sees and listens to his words. Rosi’s narrative moves balanced between archival material from the Pope’s travels, images from his cinema, current events and more recent history. “If we thought we knew everything about Bergoglio’s thinking and the value of his pilgrimages around the world, I assure you that at the end of the film you will reconsider everything as I have reconsidered myself,” commented artistic director Alberto Barbera about Rosi’s film.
WHEN THE WAVES ARE GONE
Philippines, France, Portugal, Denmark, 2022, Director Lav Diaz With John Lloyd Cruz, Ronnie Lazaro, Shamaine Buencamino Running time 187′ Distribution: n.d.
Winner of several awards at the Venice, Locarno and Berlin film festivals, Filipino director Lav Diaz is a regular at the Venice Film Festival, where in 2016 won the Golden Lion for The Woman Who Left. Known for the extraordinary length of his very low-budget films, which even artistic director Alberto Barbera joked about during the Festival’s last presentation press conference, Diaz has always stood out for a language that passes first foremost through the poetics of images. The softness of the crisp black and white of his films, made up of out-of-the-ordinary shots, is a counterpoint to the rough drama of his stories, which often dwell on the controversial contemporary political and social situation in the Philippines. When the Waves Are Gone is Diaz’s latest work; it suffered several interruptions in the making but finally sees the light of day as an Out of Competition premiere at Venice 79. In terms of production cost and duration, it differs from the director’s previous works. With a more significant international production and in just over three hours, the film tells the story of Lieutenant Hermes Papauran, one of the Philippines’ best investigators, who finds himself at a profound moral crossroads. The strict law and order policy enforced by the country’s president, Rodrigo Duterte, who has launched a full-fledged war on drugs, baffles the world with its brutality and resulting human rights violations. The atrocities committed by the police corrode Lieutenant Papauran physically and morally, while a dark past he will have to deal with haunts him.
