06/09/2008

Born in Asmara in Eritrea and both a US and Italian citizen, Gianfranco Rosi is a cosmopolitan filmmaker. A graduate of New York University Film School, he has lived in Istanbul, New York, Rome and Los Angeles. The director now presents his feature debut, Below Sea Level (following his medium-length film Boatman, which was lauded at the Sundance Festival), in the Horizons section on the Lido.

The film paints the portrait of an America far removed from stereotypes. The director explores a specific place at the edge of the world, though less than 300 kilometres from Hollywood: Slab City. The name was chosen by the inhabitants, men and women forgotten by society, who have created a makeshift home in order to circumvent the laws against the occupation of public land.

They are not homeless (the director, who lived by their side for four years, calls them “Argonauts”), but simply live – some through choice, others through necessity – in a no man’s land, 40 metres below sea level, without water or electricity.

With the help of editor Jacopo Quadri, Rosi tells the stories of seven protagonists: Ken, Lily, Mike, Wayne, Carol, Cindy and Sterling. The path that led them to this corner of the Californian desert varies from person to person: one is pursuing an anarchist ideal, one would like to return to the “civilised” world, one has a degree in theology, one man discovered his femininity after Vietnam, one writes songs and another hates flies (“I don’t understand why, on the day of the flood, God put you on the Ark”).

The eighth protagonist is the desert, which doesn’t merely serve as a backdrop. As the director (and DoP) pointed out: “In the summer it can kill and at night it engulfs the world”.

Among the most surprising (and lauded) titles at the Venice Film Festival, Below Sea Level is an Italian/US co-production piloted by Rosi’s company 21oneproductions. Ahead of the official juries’ verdict, the film has already picked up the Biografilm Lancia and Doc/it awards.

(Translated from Italian)