Precious, thanks to Covid I will tell the story of the earthquake

It may happen, as happened to Alessandro Preziosi, that Covid, the pandemic, was a sort of flywheel for his first film as a director: the documentary The law of the earthquake, previewed today at the 15th edition of the Rome Film Fest in Rome and then in the hall with the Luce on 23-24-25 November.

His poetic journey through the Italian earthquakes, from Belice to Irpinia and Amatrice, through the archives of images of the Istituto Luce is in fact accompanied by statements from men of culture and science, collected precisely during the pandemic, in which he feels the long emotional shadow of this reality that makes everyone a little more fragile, more ready to open up.

Hence statements such as those of Erri De Luca who speaks of men "like trees" and then tells "the drunken effect of earthquakes".

When it all ends, adds the writer, "we immediately start digging with that tenacity which, in the end, is the true value of humanity".

Instead, Giulio Sapelli declares: "I am a man of faith and in an earthquake I could not help but join that fantastic movement that is prayer", while Vittorio Sgarbi sees everything between art and philosophy and resorts to a paradox: "The earthquake - says the critic - it creates destruction and, at the same time, points out, for example, some important churches that no one has ever seen before and of which one does not even know.

And again Sgarbi: "The earthquake gives back to the earth what is proper to it and Ludovico Corrao and Burri did good things in designing this shroud which is the Cretto di Gibellina".

Preziosi, a very young witness to the earthquake in Irpinia in 1980, takes us through his personal narrative path, in Belìce, then in Friuli, Assisi, L'Aquila, Amatrice among archive footage, animation scenes, statements by witnesses of the time and of today: from the Fire Brigade to the volunteers up to Mario Cucinella, Pierluigi Bersani, Angelo Borrelli, Grazia Francescato and others.

"Filmed during Covid with people who had lived it and were experiencing it, I collected testimonies of great humanity such as that of De Luca who told about his' earthquake ', recalling his heart attack, or of Sapelli who declares that his' There was an emotional earthquake when he met his wife. "

Of course, adds the actor who does not hide his desire to continue experimenting with directing, "this film is about death as well as life, but above all about the great love I have for human beings".

A cult phrase from The Law of the Earthquake, produced by Khora film with Rai Cinema in association with Istituto Luce-Cinecittà in collaboration with Rai Teche, that of the great Gianni Rodari who says: "You no longer see anyone crying on the second day after the earthquake. The end of what was there is something that happened in a long time ago. Another thing has begun. We do not yet know what it will be. "