‘L’enigma di Jean Rouch a Torino - Cronaca di un film raté - Marco di Castri, Paolo Favaro, Daniele Pianciola’

The ethnographer and filmmaker Jean Rouch, who was one of the most important figures of post-war cinema, left the banks of the Niger River in the mid-80s to settle on the banks of the Po in Turin. What was he looking for in an industrial, working class city in the North of Italy which had absolutely nothing to do with Africa? This moving, and at the same time humorous, documentary tells the tale of Jean Rouch’s Turin adventure, from his first encounter with the authors in 1984 to the last day of filming of Enigma. It has been made with the aid of testimonies from those involved and an unusual series of images of this remarkable French ethnographer and filmmaker filmed at work over two years. A documented analysis of how one of his films came about, almost an anthology of his cinematographic style….

La Biennale di Venezia 2017: Venezia Classici