The Kingdom : behind the scenes in Corsica
In which it immediately stands out The Kingdomit’s the presence of the cute character of Leisa (Ghjuvanna Benedetti), who we won’t let go of throughout the film. The viewer is overwhelmed by the young woman’s intensityhis sharp gaze and his ability to understand what is happening in those around him. In Corsica, during the heat wave of the summer of 1995, Leisa experiences her first romantic emotions. He lives with his aunt, has fun with his cousins, goes to the seaside. But everything changes when her father Pierre-Paul (Saveriu Santucci), a clan leader on the run, decides to take her to him.
Through Leisa’s eyes, director Julien Colonna reveals, without judgment or concessions, this clandestine life, while a new war of clans and territories breaks out in the Corsican environment. Forced to put her carefree teenage life on hold, Leisa watches and listens. Walled in silence, without getting answers to her questions, experience the unknown, risk, fear and the worst, as much as trust. The only woman to evolve among the men of the clan, who have seen her grow, she decides and little by little takes her place.
Above all, Leisa knows and loves her father, who tries to keep his daughter away from his affairs. The increasingly strong complicity between the two is very beautiful on screenlike the ” Tcontrasting, paradisiacal, dramatic wanderings » which is the Island of Beauty. The director skillfully modulates his drama between the light of Corsica and that of Leisa, and the darkness of the criminals’ actions.
The father beyond the delinquent
Met in Bordeaux on the occasion of the preview, Julien Colonna, son of the Corsican godfather “Jean-Jé” Colonna, claims to have created“A pure cinematic fiction “. Certainly, he was inspired by the truth of a context he knewand drew on his own filial relationship with his father. And indeed, it is the collateral damage on a daughter’s relationship with her father that is at the heart of this powerful drama that is The Kingdom.
The impact of this life on the run on the relationships of the men of the clan with the women in their lives, such as Fabien with his mother, or Ste with his wife, is also discussed. Men respectful of the young woman, to whom she also becomes fond, while the grip of death tightens. The Kingdom subtly questions the continuum of violence, the reproduction of the family model of revenge, the weight of inheritance and the control of one’s destiny.
Creating great empathy towards all the charactersthe director brilliantly shows the consequences of the choices of power and revenge on the lives of those close to him. For the director, who wrote the film together with Jeanne Herry (I will always see your faces), these notions of choice were“one of the most fertile lands”. They were the subject of long philosophical discussions and explorations of their personal sensibilities.
For their part, the two actors, non-professionalsthey carry the film in a remarkable way. The director fell in love artistically with Ghjuvanna Benedetti, among a cast of about a hundred girls. “ His biggest challenge was to be sufficiently charming in his gaze and his taciturn physical presence. Especially because she acted only by listening, like a sentinel child with her dull pain.” The Kingdomthanks to its story and its actors, it therefore reveals itself a moving first feature film, whose thriller aspect cleverly contrasts with the spring underwear.
The Kingdom by Julien Colonna, in theaters from November 13, 2024. Above is the trailer.
Source: Cine Serie
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