Transcript: ‘La chimera’ — everything you’d want in an Italian film

This is an audio transcript of the Life and Art from FT Weekend podcast episode: ‘‘La chimera’ — everything you’d want in an Italian film’

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Katya Kumkova
This is Life and Art from FT Weekend. I’m Katya Kumkova. I’m in for Lilah Raptopoulos and this is our Friday chat show. Today we’re talking about La Chimera, a movie directed by Alice Rohrwacher, and starring Josh O’Connor and Isabella Rossellini. It’s a story about a band of Italian grave robbers who are out to steal Etruscan treasure. But its main focus is on the band’s English leader, Arthur, who has the gift of knowing when he’s close to something worth looting. The best way I can describe this movie, though, is to say it’s an Italian film that has everything you want in an Italian film. There are a couple of love plots, there are melancholy troubadours. There’s a beach dancing scene that can almost be in a Fellini movie. So let’s get into it. I’m Katya. I’m the show’s senior producer, and I’m hiding a couple of children at the place where I’m pretending to work. With me today in our London studio is the FT’s head of audio, Cheryl Brumley. She’s looking to appraise some loot today. Hi, Cheryl.

Cheryl Brumley
Hi.

Katya Kumkova
Hi. Hopefully we’ll get you something nice and expensive. And also in London, it’s Italia herself. Audience engagement journalist Marianna Giusti. Welcome, Mari.

Marianna Giusti
Hi, Katya.

Katya Kumkova
Hi. Hi. Hi. OK. So let’s get into it. What did we think about the movie? Did we like it? Did we hate it? Cheryl, why don’t we start with you?

Cheryl Brumley
I love this film and there’s many, many reasons why and things I’m sure we’ll get into. But just two things aesthetically that really sort of enhance my enjoyment of the film is one: This isn’t the Italy of at least modern Italian films as I know it. It’s not James Bond on rooftops in Siena. It’s not under the Tuscan sun. It’s beaches on the back of factories and sort of abandoned apartment buildings with rebar sticking out. It’s just sort of like a really gritty, rural Italian landscape. And the sunflowers are dead. And it was just something really different. And then the other thing I really love about this film is that there is probably in most scenes, about half a dozen people. And I just thought there was a real kind of joy in sort of the crowd and these personalities, and it was just really scintillating with that joy of other people and being around other people.

Marianna Giusti
It’s so funny that you say that about it not being the Italy that I think is what most people internationally associate with. Especially, I think, cinematic Italy, it being the home of so many really like glamorous movies known internationally. I grew up in Tuscany, not long after the period in which the film is set. And I have to say, I did recognise a lot of the really authentic, provincial, non-glamour, non-touristy, really, really regional, popular Tuscany. Popular as in not that it’s famous, but that it’s really of the people that you said that there are at least half a dozen people in each shot. That’s so true.

Katya Kumkova
Yeah. And you were saying you really like some of the, like, really local Italian stuff, right? Like there’s a scene, it’s a huge feast and everyone dresses in drag for some reason. That’s a real thing, right?

Marianna Giusti
Yeah, 100 per cent. And one of the things I saw that I don’t think was ever portrayed in an internationally distributed movie before was the feast of the epiphany, where I also used to dress up as a little Befana, which it’s says, sort of half pagan, epiphany celebration where old ladies with giant noses fly on broomsticks. And that’s a real thing. And the whole town celebrates and sort of goes out to the streets and drinks and dresses like an old lady. I have to admit, I wasn’t the biggest fan of Alice Rohrwacher movies, but I mean, I don’t know how you just can’t be in love with Isabella Rossellini and Josh O’Connor generally. And also from sort of midway onwards, the plot and the symbolism really, really start to thicken and become really, really interesting. And it sort of really dawns on you in the last part of the film, what it all means. Would you agree, Cheryl?

Cheryl Brumley
Yeah, I would definitely agree. And I sort of read before going into this film that it was magical realist and it sort of felt like that it might have been more inaccessible than what they described. But actually, going in, it kind of really just all kind of comes together. All this sort of symbolism, all the metaphorical stuff about capitalism and lost love and underground movements and things like that. I think it all just kind of came together.

Marianna Giusti
Absolutely. It’s like at the end you have all the pieces of the puzzle.

Katya Kumkova
Yeah, I loved it too. It’s funny, it has all of these like quite serious themes, right? Like loss and antiquity and politics. But it’s actually it’s such a kind movie in a lot of ways. I mean, my first thought is, like you, Cheryl, I just thought it was so beautiful. It’s shot on 32- and 16-mm film, and it kinda has that groundedness of the visuals. There’s like a ton of bird shots and these frescoes and it’s just so visually beautiful. And then I also thought it was funny. Everyone’s trying to, like, pull one over on everyone else. There’s this woman named Italia who is basically taking advantage of this dowager aristocrat, who is played by Isabella Rossellini. And Isabella Rossellini thinks she is teaching Italia how to sing, and that’s why she’s there. But really, she’s there because she wants the free lodging, and she’s, in fact, hiding a couple of kids. Kind of, like I said, at the top. So, yeah, it’s just kind of lovely and has a kind of optimism about it despite some of the serious themes, I thought.

Marianna Giusti
I didn’t find that optimist at all. I completely agree with you that it blended beautifully, comedy and tragedy. I thought if you take out all of the comic elements, like there’s really slapstick scenes where the action is sped up and they look like a sort of almost mute film from the ‘40s. If you take out all of those elements, it’s a really sad story. I wasn’t left with an optimistic feeling.

Cheryl Brumley
Oh, that’s interesting. I was sort of in between. I thought similarly, Katya, that it was kind in the sense that there weren’t any villainy villains, you know, the real villain that we kind of find out who that person is towards the end of the movie. Was sort of also kind of slapstick in a way. And then, you know, even the tomb raiders, they weren’t portrayed as these evil guys. Right? And women. I thought that she treated her characters, like, with a lot of kindness and let their sort of personalities sort of show through. And like, I talked about the sort of joy of the group. But that said, I also felt similar to Mari in that I’m not sure that the end of the film was sort of a happy one for me. I came away with sort of a happy message.

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Katya Kumkova
Let’s kind of get into it a little bit more about how the story is told. This movie has a lot of devices. There are people turning to the camera and speaking directly into it and breaking the fourth wall. There’s a place where, or a couple of places where musicians kind of just move the story along by singing what happens next or what happened. But then there’s this kind of double plot. There’s the sad part of it all where Arthur is looking for a girlfriend who is dead or maybe lost. And then there’s the grave-robbing stuff and basically everything else, including the cavorting. And there’s another love interest. What did you guys think of this double plot thing?

Cheryl Brumley
I thought one of the things that really sort of stuck out to me — because there are a lot of themes in this film, and somehow it all gets tied together at the end — but one of the things that stuck out to me was living with the past. And, you know, Isabella Rossellini is living in this sort of crumbling mansion. You have the setting of Italy, where you’re kind of living with the past every day in these beautiful villages. You have the people breaking into the past and going underground to raid these tombs and Etruscan artefacts. And you also have Arthur himself, the main character, played by Josh O’Connor, who’s trying to either let go or find a woman from his recent past. And also at the same time, being kind of pulled forward into the future with this woman, Italia, who’s living in Isabella Rossellini’s mansion. So that sort of theme came through very strongly for me.

Katya Kumkova
It’s funny, Cheryl, because I totally see what you’re saying. But I have to admit, I totally missed the importance of the missing girlfriend plot. There was so much going on. You kind of kept learning that everyone, all of the characters weren’t exactly who you thought they were. And by the time that the ending came around and the prominence of the sad plot was clear, I just kind of felt really bamboozled. I didn’t see it coming at all. Mari, what else stuck out to you?

Marianna Giusti
Yeah, I read an interview with Alice Rohrwacher in which she speaks about, being aware of the tombaroli growing up. Which is something that is very specific to her region in the area of Tuscany where I grew up. And they learned Rohrwacher actually spent time with the real-life tomb raiders, some of whom I imagine are still living. I don’t know if, as a criminal organisation, they’re still active. I suspect not. But I really appreciated the sort of philological quality of her filmmaking.

Katya Kumkova
What do you mean by philological, Mari?

Marianna Giusti
Like this rigour in being very studios and very meticulous and actually adhering to the truth. There’s so much about blending contemporary squalor and criminality with this really glorious lost past. And I think she does that beautifully.

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Katya Kumkova
Let’s talk about what the film says about Italy. Like you were saying, Mari, it’s kind of a hyperlocal movie in a way. Has lots of Italian references, and it also has a lot to say about Italy and Italian politics and where it kind of wants Italy to be going. Am I right about that?

Marianna Giusti
You’re absolutely right, Katya, in that this is a movie that’s really, in my opinion, about Italy and in particular about the gaze of Italy and its troubled relationship both to its past and to its future alike. I thought it was a curious aspect, the fact that the character who is named Italia, and it seems to really be symbolising this vital force that every other character clearly is lacking. She’s actually a Brazilian immigrant with kids, one of whom is mixed-race or black. And, at least in my reading and my interpretation of it, she’s like this beam of hope and it’s almost like the director is trying to say that Italy’s future, Italy’s only hope, would come from its immigrants, which I don’t know. That was my reading of it.

Cheryl Brumley
That’s really interesting interpretation because I thought when she said her name was Italia, and there’s another sort of character in the film who always, when she sees her say, Viva Italia. I thought that was a really bold choice of saying she is symbolising something, but I guess I never, you know, watching the film didn’t sort of take it as her being an immigrant, but I think it’s really interesting thesis.

Katya Kumkova
Is it something that you can tell from the plot? Because I know the actress is Brazilian, but can you tell in the plot that she’s an immigrant?

Marianna Giusti
Yeah, because she’s speaking Brazilian Portuguese to the children. So I guess if you don’t understand Italian, you think you might think it’s Italian? She’s speaking Portuguese. Yep.

Katya Kumkova
Totally missed it.

Cheryl Brumley
That would be why I missed that.

Marianna Giusti
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, well, that was my analysis, but I thought it was so interesting how it’s such a complex relationship between Italy’s and the ways perceived there are all these foreign characters with often the best of intentions. But there is this element of a presence of a foreign gaze. So there are the American tourists who ask to have their picture taken by the ruins, by the tombs. And then there are the very rich, I think American and international buyers of art, who are completely oblivious to the world that lies beyond these artefacts they’re interested in buying.

Katya Kumkova
Right. Is there anything you missed from this movie, anything that you would have wanted it to address?

Marianna Giusti
I guess something that is missing is that for me, the tombaroli are obviously a historical figure. They existed. But they really are the embryo of what then came to be Italy’s modern, economic model, which is so reliant on tourism and of, like, allowing others to plunder. It’s basically commodifying its legacy and its treasure. And that’s what it goes back to, you know, when Josh O’Connor is on the train and there are these Tuscan girls telling him, have you seen this thing that I was buried with I needed for the afterworld? And he’s stolen it for money. So that really kind of shows you the tension between capitalism and culture and cultural legacy.

Cheryl Brumley
I think the capitalist theme was something that clearly the director, Alice, wanted people to leave and to sort of think about after watching this film. I mean, Arthur himself, he is wearing a kind of — at the beginning of the film — really crisp linen suit, and by the end it’s fairly muddy. But it’s suggested to me because his attire was so different that he had a sort of different background to your sort of average tombaroli. And somebody else had sort of pointed that out in the film to him that you’re not like them. Sort of scrounge stealing for the kind of, for the sort of, acquiring wealth element.

Marianna Giusti
Oh, 100 per cent. Do you remember that scene in which I think they’re negotiating a price for some artefacts, and that’s also a moment where the fourth wall is broken and the tombaroli start to behave like dogs, barking at each other.

Cheryl Brumley
Yes. I almost forgot. Yeah, that was really odd.

Marianna Giusti
That was so explicit. And it’s exactly what you’re saying, that he wasn’t like them. He had other motives, like, nobler motives.

Katya Kumkova
Yeah. So it’s funny. We want to wrap up but I will say that the reason I think I had so much optimism from the movie is because it does give you a way out. Right? So, Italia, in the end, founds a little feminist commune with children and, you know, communal care. And Arthur’s character is actually invited to it. You know, there is a different way to live. And that somehow really gave me a lot of hope. Mari, Cheryl, thank you so much. We’re gonna take a little break and we’re gonna do More or Less.

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Katya Kumkova
Welcome back to More or Less, the section where we say what we want more or less of, culturally. And, Mari, let’s start with you. What do you got for us?

Marianna Giusti
More of Isabella Rossellini everywhere, all the time and every role.

Cheryl Brumley
I really agree. Yeah. She was wonderful.

Marianna Giusti
Yeah. I wanted to get to know the old matriarch a little bit more.

Cheryl Brumley
Yeah, I thought that in terms of character development, I thought they could have spent more time with her for sure.

Katya Kumkova
Yeah. She’s so great. And who can forget the insect porno that she did a few years ago?

Marianna Giusti
Green Porno. Exactly.

Cheryl Brumley
I have no idea what that is in reference to but I need to look it up.

Marianna Giusti
Documentary series about insects having sex or animals having sex.

Katya Kumkova
I think mostly insects. But yeah, worth your time, definitely. Cheryl, what do you got for us?

Cheryl Brumley
OK, so I had something very sophisticated to say, and then I just threw it out this weekend after seeing Eurovision. Because I really, truly believe, despite all the controversy this year, because there was quite a lot, I really, truly believe it is the best live television show on the planet. It is so high production value. Controversial, I know, but it is a very high production value and I just love it. I just adore it so much. Everyone else who disagrees with me is wrong because it is just the most incredible thing. And when I moved to Europe or I moved to the UK about 17 years ago now, I saw it and I was just like, what is this? But what it is, is the best spectacle on the planet.

Katya Kumkova
So more Eurovision, more spectacles. What do we want?

Cheryl Brumley
More Eurovision. I would love a Eurovision in the winter when we most need that sort of pick up. Just more Eurovision.

Katya Kumkova
OK. More Eurovision. Mine’s a little weird. I want more smell art. I guess we’re all doing more. I want more smell art. There’s currently an exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum called Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion. And I have to admit, I have not seen it. But from what I understand, they took some molecules off of these old clothes that are, you know, from the early 19th century and maybe even before, and they reconstituted the smells from them. As the reviewer in the FT wrote, you know, who is this lady, she’s dead but I’m smelling her pits. And I’m not such a fan of smelling pits but I do think smell art is so cool. I went to a performance a couple of years ago where they reconstituted, everyone got a little swatch of a flower, it was a hibiscus flower that’s no longer around. And I just think that stuff is so cool and I want more of it.

Cheryl Brumley
Amazing. Well, I’ve learned something new today. (Laughter)

Katya Kumkova
Well, Cheryl, Mari, thank you again so much. This was so fun.

Cheryl Brumley
Thank you.

Marianna Giusti
Thank you.

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Katya Kumkova
That’s the show. Thank you for listening to Life and Art from FT Weekend. I’ve put some links in the show notes to things that we talked about on the show, and every link that brings each lift will get you past the paywall. I’m Katya Kumkova. I am the show’s senior producer. And here’s our amazing team. Lulu Smyth is our producer. Our sound engineers are Breen Turner and Sam Giovinco with original music by Metaphor Music. Topher Forhecz is our executive producer and our global head of audio is Cheryl Brumley, who you heard today. Have a lovely week and Lilah will be back on Monday.