12/02/2014 - The environmentally friendly film by Edoardo Winspeare was presented in the Panorama section at the 64th Berlinale

In his new film, In grazia di Dio [+see also:
trailer
film profile], presented in the Panorama section at the 64^th edition of the Berlin International Film Festival, the Apulia-native director Edoardo Winspeare (Il Miracolo [+see also:
trailer
film profile], Galantuomini [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]) explores the theme of returning to one’s roots and the possibility for happiness during an economic and moral crisis that seems never ending.

The story’s background is a little village in Salento where society seems to have stopped somewhere in the 1980s and the only sign of modern life in and among traditional ceremonies, old cars and vespas, is the suggestion of an economic crisis.

Adele (Celeste Casciaro, the director’s wife) is a hard woman who never smiles. She manages a small manufacturing company with her brother and sister Maria Concetta (Barbara De Matteis), the only one in the family to hold a university degree and who is also obsessed with theatre. Things are not going well: Adele is falling short on a loan and has just lost a big contract with a producer in the North.

The family’s debt starts threatening the its stability: Adele’s good but problem-ridden ex-husband ends up in prison, her brother is forced to emigrate to Switzerland and the family home ends up being sold for very little to a speculator.

The only thing left for Adele, her mother Salvatrice (Anna Boccadamo), her daughter Ina (Laura Licchetta) and Maria Concetta to do is to move to an old countryside house, work the land and try and engage in a subsistence economy to survive.

The theme in itself is insidious, and when combined with enchanting landscapes including olive trees overlooking the sea and white walled villages, the risk is that it becomes a postcard for a beautiful, yet poor South.

Winspeare tries to avoid this by building a plot – mostly believable – around four women of different generations, all different but united by a tough situation of decay and marginalisation. And if the underlying message for a return to the land and a search for happiness is not an original one, it should be handed to the director that he managed to infuse his difficult characters with a touch of humanity.

In grazia di Dio is an environmentally friendly film as the director put it: shot in Salento with non-professional actors with a small budget integrated into a bartering system where food donated by private sponsors was used in exchange for services. 

(Translated from Italian)