Reveries of a Solitary Walker aka Fantasticherie di un passeggiatore solitario

Showings

New People Cinema Mon, Nov 9, 2015 9:00 PM
Film Info
Director:Paolo Gaudio
Running Time:84
Country:Italy
Year of Release:2014

Description

The end is full of desire and dread in Paolo Gaudio’s mixed-media experiment Reveries of a Solitary Walker. Taking its title from an unfinished work by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the film interweaves parallel tales, all in search of their own ending. In one, as Theo (Lorenzo Monaco), haunted by unresolved traumas from his childhood, struggles to finish a thesis on unfinished texts, he tries to go on the walk missing from Rousseau’s text in search of the ‘Vacuitas’ (or void) that he believes can reverse unwanted pasts.

In another, told in claymation, a boy and an old man enact Rousseau’s fairytale walks through the woods. And in a third, Svankmajer-esque episode, Rousseau (Luca Lionello) himself battles the green fairy of absinthe and the ghost of his wife as he tries to confront his demons – or at least a demon – through finishing his writings. Tonally, the film is all over the place, and overplays its own quirkiness to often irritating effect – but as a showcase for Gaudio’s mastery of different cinematic forms, it’s an impressive calling card. It also, appropriately enough, comes with a good ending.

Written by Anton Bitel of BFI.org