The tagline for Alexander Sokurov’s mesmerizing Francofonia—an elegy for Europe—is apt. Evoking a history of the Louvre Museum from the Renaissance to the present, Sokurov masterfully weaves a moving tableau of newsreels, voiceovers and staged re-enactments, as he meditates on the essential relationship between art, culture, and history. Key in this freeform historical narrative is 1940 and the Nazi invasion of Paris, and the resulting push-pull relationship between Jacques Jaujard, the steadfast director of the Louvre, and Count Franziskus Wolf- Metternich, the Nazi officer put in charge of the Louvre.
Press
"A bold and confident film from Aleksandr Sokurov roams the corridors of the Paris museum to reflect on its history from the Renaissance to the present." - The Guardian
SPONSORED BY