Paysage enseveli. Portrait d’une femme en 12 tableaux

Réalisation: Blas Payri
Performance: Lorenza Di Calogero
Caméras: Rafel Arnal & Blas Payri
Son & postproduction: Blas Payri

“Paysage enseveli” (translatable as “Shrouded landscape”) is a work that I have been developing for some years, to explore the concept of Leitmotiv in the visual medium. It is divided in 10 movements (scenes) that reflect an ambience or a feeling of the main character, a woman whose inner voice leads us through the different movements. It represents the inner journey and mutation of the character.
First, the soundtrack has been built, using sound leitmotivs linked to the voice of the character (humming, laughter, whisper) or to external sources (bells, drone). The image has been built using also the leitmotiv approach, where each visual element is related to an idea or a feeling: the woods symbolize the leitmotiv of the social oppression, the sea/water as the leitmotiv of destruction, the wandering/walking of the character as the leitmotiv of the search for a meaning, the body position (laying down, crouching) as the mood of the character.

The text excerpts have been adapted from the novel “Thérèse Desqueyroux” (1927) by François Mauriac, selecting the passages for their poetic rather than narrative content.