(ANSA) - BERLIN, 11 FEB - A relaxed and serene Dario Argento today at the Berlinale together with his daughter Asia and Ilenia Pastorelli talks about his return to the big screen with OCCHIALI NERI, "more a thriller than a horror" Berlin hotel full of Italian journalists.
And to those who ask him "where evil lurks today" he immediately replies: "I'm certainly not a sociologist and I always follow in my films the same line I had as a boy when I abstracted from the normal world and threw myself into these adventures that I saw just as much. But I know - he continues - that evil has changed today. For example, today there is a truly terrible ferocity among children, but this is also true for adults. A ferocity that once did not exist ".
What does the film that passed today at the 72nd edition of the Berlin Film Festival tell us in the Special Gala section?
It tells of a solar eclipse, a prelude to a perpetual blindness, the one that strikes a young high-class escort, Diana (Ilenia Pastorelli), who crashes into a car to escape a serial killer.
However, Diana decides not to break down and fights for her survival as the serial killer continues to haunt her.
On her side are Nerea, her German wolf dog, and little Chin, a Chinese man who survived the accident.
For Asia Argento, however, no dark role this time: she plays a reliable assistant who helps the blind to move in a world without light.
OCCHIALI NERI, shot in Italian and from 24 February in theaters with Vision Distribution, is somewhat reminiscent of
the first films of the master of horror, combining his unique direct style with strokes of true genius, as it is in the first part with the scenes of the solar eclipse, with parts in the sign of excessive simplicity.
In short, a patchy film that is difficult to disappoint his fans who love him regardless.
"My daughter Asia found this script in a drawer while she was looking for material for her book. I had totally forgotten about it - the 82-year-old director said today in Berlin -, I reread it and it was very beautiful. During the lockdown then, forced like everyone at home, I calmly put my hands in it and gave it like a whip, made it gallop. Then the artistic director of the Berlinale, Chatrian, came to my house and invited me to his festival without any having seen the film ".
And Argento does not hide how important the experience with Gaspar Noè in VORTEX was for him, which made him win the award for best actor in Locarno: "That film was all improvised. He made me enter the world of actors by making me understand certain secrets after more than fifty years of career ".
Instead Asia explains: "I had never forgotten this script in which among the elements there is also a supernatural vision of nature. My character? I liked to be a positive character always ready to help others for once."
A new Silver after the experience with Noah?
"He was very serene on the set - underlined his daughter - where he used improvisation a lot, thus proving to be an ageless author and at the same time a teacher who always remains humble"
.
Finally, Pastorelli says: "To prepare myself I met blind women and I discovered the incredible strength they have to face this handicap. I then also blindfolded myself at home, a truly terrifying thing, and I started from this terror".
(HANDLE).