The Civil War to discover the roots of today’s America. Roberto Minervini chooses to travel through time to return to explore and talk about the lacerations of the United States, in which he has lived and worked for years. He does it with a fiction film, his first, “The Damned”, which just last night won the first prize in the “Un certain regard” section at Cannes as best director. “The Damned” takes us to the winter of 1862, at the height of the conflict, together with a handful of soldiers sent to guard the unexplored lands of the West. Shot in Montana but post-produced in Turin with the support of Film Commission Torino Piemonte, the film was produced by Okta Film and Pulpa Film with Rai Cinema. Today the director presents it to the Turin public at 8.30pm at the Cinema Nazionale. «I have been working on the idea of this film for several years – he says – After having felt the pulse of America for ten years with my films I wanted to try to think about its roots. On January 6, 2021, with the assault on the Capitol, which was in fact an attempted coup d’état, I understood that the time had come.”
To do this he chose to travel to the past. How come?
«This film starts from a dialectic between present and past and could have been made in two ways. If I had done it in the present, with an approach closer to the cinema of reality, I would have run the risk of pontificating. Returning to the past, however, wearing the shoes of a 19th century American, allowed me to work on something more existential, rather than overtly political and contemporary.”
Why did you choose the Civil War?
«Because it is a war whose objective was to destroy and then unite, razing certainties and foundations to the ground and then building something new. America wanted to strengthen itself and present itself as a democratic alternative to European monarchical models and it did so by destroying everything within itself. This recalls the contemporary, the Trump presidency with its constant erosion of institutions and founding values, even of truth and transparency, to try to build something else.”
Through that of Secession, “The Damned” talks about all wars, about the existential condition of being at war. «I wanted to work on the most essential core, the lowest common denominator of war: the battle. Wars are a series of battles, within which only extermination exists. For me it was important not to give elements to justify war action as genre cinema does, with concepts such as heroism, martyrdom, just cause, homeland or dichotomy between good and evil, which end up distorting the debate on whether or not Of the war”.
What would you like the viewer to take home?
«Mine is a film that first of all wants to stimulate reflection on the senselessness of every conflict. Then I would like the public to learn to adopt a more critical point of view when faced with enjoying the spectacle of war through genre cinema, because there is nothing spectacular about war. Finally, I would like those who watch “The Damned” to let themselves be guided by the characters, abandoning the need to cling to a plot typical of conventional fiction cinema. This is a journey in which we also lose the perception of space-time within a war from which we cannot escape.”
Today he returns to Turin where he worked on the post-production of the film. How did he find it?
«I worked for a month with Imago VFX and I found a fantastic working group with which to share an authorial vision. And I found great availability on the part of the institutions and the precious support of the Film Commission. An artistic and human treasure that I didn’t expect and that encourages me to return in the future. And then, allow me to say, I have never eaten so well.”
