Paolo Zucca he returned to the cinema with “Gospel according to Mary”, a film inspired by the novel of the same name by Barbara Alberti published in 1979. A story of rebellion and redemption, which features two great names in Italian cinema: Alessandro Gassman and Benedetta Porcaroli.
On May 23, the film was released in Italian cinemas and had its national premiere in Cagliari, where some scenes of the story are set, between the Saint Remy Bastion and the San Michele park.
But in the film by the director from Cagliari, there is all of Sardinia, starting from the town of Cabras, in Sinis, where the city of Nazareth was reproduced, up to the nuragic areas of Tamuli, in Macomer, and Genna Salixi, in Villa Sant’Antonio, which offer an atmosphere between the magical and the dark, taking viewers into a dimension out of time.
Let’s start with the film. How did the idea come about?
The idea for the film was born fifteen years ago, after the author Barbara Alberti had seen my short film “The referee”, which then became a film. In 2009 we met in Oristano thanks to the author Filippo Martinez, and Alberti tells me that she was very impressed by the black and white setting, the landscapes so free, wild and metaphysical, and by the ancient faces of the protagonists. She said that it reminded her of something biblical, so she advised me to read her novel and I must say that she really opened the doors to my imagination. After an initial hesitation, which had to do with the fact that the text dealt with very strong themes related to religion, I finally accepted and started working on the project.
A few years have passed, but the topic is still hot.
Yes, the project didn’t start immediately because the time was probably not yet ripe. We wanted to take up the underlying theme of the novel and present it again with a dual perspective, so that everyone can read the message in a different and personal way. But in any case the film maintains all its initial energy: our young Maria is also a rebel who will carry out an act of extreme disobedience in the film too. There is both a disruptive element and a final question addressed to the audience in the room. From my point of view, the solution we found is more interesting from a dramaturgical point of view and also less disturbing.
The two protagonists are Alessandro Gassman, who plays Giuseppe, and Benedetta Porcaroli, who plays the role of young Maria. Why did you choose these two actors?
As for Gassman, he has always been a bit of an obsession of mine since he shot my first film “The Arbiter” in 2013. For me he has always had an interesting physicality and was perfect to play Giuseppe, who is a gentle giant, a rude man, but of extraordinary generosity and is the only positive character in a world in a retrograde way. Furthermore, his voice, so deep and cavernous, suited the character I had in mind perfectly.
Benedetta Porcaroli, on the other hand, is one of the young Italian actresses of the moment.
Yes, it must be said that I didn’t know Benedetta yet. When I started thinking about the film, she was still very young. Today we found her in her ideal condition, she is now 25 but she easily looks 16. She has the face of a little girl and in fact I put her together with the other little girls in the film. Nicola Giuliano, who is one of the producers of the film together with Amedeo Pagani, recommended it to me. What convinced me about Bendetta, in addition to her skill and talent acquired over fifteen years of work, is her cinematic beauty. When she starts acting and stares at the screen, her gaze becomes dazzling, her eyes are transfigured, she manages to convey a sense of depth that is never banal.
You also chose Sardinia as the set for this latest film. Can you tell us how the filming went?
Yes, I’ll start immediately from the city of Cagliari, where I wanted to set a dream, that of Maria. To do this, I was looking for a “De Chirico” type setting, a bit like metaphysical paintings and the city seemed perfect to me, because I saw it precisely in this light. In particular, I had thought of the street lamps of the Saint Remy Bastion as a geometric and modern element that could break the spell of antiquity, also because in my film I don’t describe the city of Nazareth in an overly philological way. After editing, however, more than one person pointed out to me that these streetlights distracted from the psychological state of the character, so I deleted them one by one digitally.
Then there is also the most legendary Sardinia of archaeological and landscape sites.
Yes, they are all beautiful places and above all functional in relation to what we wanted to represent. For example, Nazareth was set in a nuragic settlement called Tamuli, in Macomer. We wanted to give the biblical town a dark and stony setting, then at a certain point it even started raining and we continued filming which contributed to giving this dark character. Then there is the necropolis of Genna Salixi, in Villa Sant’Antonio, where we imagined Giuseppe’s apartment, surrounded by a magical atmosphere. We are talking about a thousand-year-old site, which arouses incredible fascination. But while filming, I also made some interesting discoveries.
Tell us.
I discovered that in the small church of San Giovanni, in Sinis, which I used as the synagogue of Nazareth in the year zero, the writing “shalom” was found and remained until the seventies, so most likely for a certain period it was actually used as a synagogue, before becoming an early Christian basilica. Among other things, I also discovered that even in Israel there are very ancient stone buildings that closely resemble our nuraghi. So let’s say that the choice of set in Sardinia ultimately proved to be the most suitable one to represent this story.
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