Long before the film, the phrase captured the literary world through Sebastiano Vassalli’s masterpiece novel . Set in the 17th century under the shadow of the Spanish Inquisition, it tells the tragic story of Antonia, an orphaned girl adopted by a peasant family in a small village near Novara. The Illusion of Justice
La Chimera is deeply steeped in a rich tapestry of mythological and literary influences. Rohrwacher uses a distinct, "cinematic poetry" that moves away from traditional, linear storytelling. Instead, the film operates on a plane of , where the boundary between the living and the dead, the present and the past, becomes porous.
Much has (rightly) been made of Josh O’Connor’s performance. He is a long way from Prince Charles in The Crown . Here, he is all knotted sinew and downward gaze. Arthur moves like a man who is constantly falling in slow motion. He lopes. He slumps. He has a laugh that sounds like a cough. But his eyes—his eyes are the film’s true special effect. They are hollow, then suddenly, terrifyingly full of light. He can see what others cannot: the invisible thread connecting the living to the buried.
Fans of Happy as Lazzaro , Portrait of a Lady on Fire (for the longing), Tarkovsky’s Nostalghia , or anyone who believes that cinema can be prayer. La Chimera
Ultimately, La Chimera is an enchanting, melancholic, and deeply hopeful piece of art. It gently reminds us that we are all walking on top of history, pulling on our own "red threads" to find connection in a fractured world. Through Arthur's journey, Rohrwacher invites the audience to stop trying to conquer or commodify what has been left behind. Instead, she asks us to respect the sacred mysteries of life and death, teaching us how to carry the weight of the past while still learning how to live in the present. Share public link
Rohrwacher rejects rigid, linear time structures. By mixing different film stocks (35mm, 16mm, and Super 8), she presents time as an overlapping, continuous cycle where the ancient dead and the living coexist seamlessly in the same landscape.
The story of La Chimera's demise is attributed to the hero Bellerophon, a Greek warrior who was said to have received the winged horse Pegasus from the goddess Athena. With Pegasus' help, Bellerophon was able to fly above the Chimera and attack it from a safe distance. According to some accounts, Bellerophon shot the Chimera with a poisoned arrow, which ultimately led to its downfall. Long before the film, the phrase captured the
Melds historical realism with folkloric fantasy; firmly rejects patriarchal and capitalistic structures in favor of community and care for the earth.
The film explores the friction between sacred history and capitalist exploitation. The Etruscan treasures were made for the dead, not for human eyes, posing a moral dilemma when dug up for profit.
It is a film about the weight of history—not just the history in textbooks, but the history in the soil, in our bones, and in our hearts. Alice Rohrwacher has crafted a eulogy for the living and a love letter to the dead. It asks us to consider our own Chimeras: What impossible thing are we searching for? And what happens if we actually find it? Rohrwacher uses a distinct, "cinematic poetry" that moves
In the landscape of contemporary European cinema, few filmmakers possess the ability to dig through the soil of reality and uncover the sparkling gems of myth quite like . Her fourth feature film, La Chimera (2023), serves as a mesmerizing masterclass in magic realism, offering a deeply poignant meditation on grief, history, and humanity's complicated relationship with what lies beneath our feet. Set against the sun-bleached, gritty backdrop of 1980s Tuscany, the film stands as the triumphant culmination of Rohrwacher's unofficial "Tuscia Trilogy," alongside Le meraviglie (2014) and Lazzaro felice (2018).
Uses physical film stocks to craft an earthy, tactile atmosphere that makes the dust, soil, and sunlight feel tangible to the viewer.
Religious fanaticism, collective hysteria, and the abuse of political power Why the Concept of "La Chimera" Endures