, a bedraggled Englishman newly released from prison. Driven by a desperate longing for his lost love, Beniamina, he uses a dowsing rod to locate hidden tombs for a rowdy band of grave robbers known as A Mythological Quest : The film is often described as a modern retelling of the Orpheus and Eurydice
La Chimera feels like a dream you wake from and immediately try to return to. Rohrwacher uses time strangely. Characters pause mid-sentence. The world tilts. The score (by the experimental group La Tarma ) blends whistles, industrial clangs, and folk songs. La Chimera
Rohrwacher does not offer easy answers. She shows the beauty of the recovered artifacts (real Etruscan art is featured prominently) but also the violence of their removal. The film’s most tragic sequence involves the destruction of a priceless fresco when a tunnel collapses—a metaphor for how the desperation of the present can destroy the treasures of the past. , a bedraggled Englishman newly released from prison
Alice Rohrwacher's 2023 film La Chimera blends realism with magical elements to follow a dejected English archaeologist (Josh O'Connor) navigating the 1980s Italian underworld of tomb raiding, or tombaroli . The critically acclaimed film is recognized for its unique visual texture, created through mixed film formats to explore themes of loss and the blurred lines between the past and present. For a detailed critique, read The Guardian's review . Characters pause mid-sentence
: While the gang seeks gold, Arthur seeks a "red thread" that might lead him back to Beniamina. His thievery isn't driven by greed, but by a desperate wish to resurrect what is gone. The Visual Language of Magic Realism