Emanuela Piovano’s Le Stelle Inquiete is an unconventional romance, rich with ideas and imagery. Based on the life of French philosopher Simone Weil, it focuses on an experience of hers two years before she died at the age of 34. Entirely devoted to her passionate pursuit of knowledge, affairs of the heart hold no interest for her. But in the summer of 1941, fate steps into Simone’s life.
Her hosts are an Italian couple, Gustave and Yvette, who own a vineyard in a bucolic region of Provence, seemingly untouched by the war. Concerned with workers’ rights, Simone’s ideas challenge Gustave’s monarchist ideals. Both he and his wife see nothing wrong with owning land and giving people jobs, as long as they treat everyone fairly. Simone is fascinated by the workers who, unlike those in Paris, appear happy with the inequality inherent between owner and worker. Excitedly, she scribbles a note to herself: When there’s a relationship, there’s acceptance of one’s misfortune and the luck of others. Insights like these intrigue Gustave more and more, but instead of changing his ideas, he becomes enamoured of Simone, wanting to possess her physically. Not an intellectual, Yvette looks helplessly on as the relationship between her husband and the philosopher grows.
Despite the potentially heavy subject that philosophy can be, director Piovano delivers a remarkably airy film. Partly that’s to do with how Simone skirts away from any subject that would tie her to down to matters of the flesh. Like a mystic, she insists on living in a shack without amenities (instead of staying in the main house), eats only enough to subsist, and is unconcerned about her looks. She brooks no distractions from her work, which is to think.
The film’s airiness is also due to director Piovano’s aesthetic approach: “I wanted to make a simple film, light and airy, as Simone would have like it.”
Piovano’s aim is evident from the very first scene. It’s a shot of the woods on Gustave’s property, taken at dusk, that mysterious time of day when things appear as if by fleeting magic. The director invites us to look at this shot for a few, luxuriously long moments, and returns to this same image several times throughout the film, each time adding a plant faintly stirred by wind or footfall, or the ghostly image of Simone flitting between the trees. The ephemeral beauty of this moment in Simone’s life is powerfully conveyed.
Another arresting scene in the film is when Yvette comes upon her husband sleeping at the kitchen table, his hand on Simone’s notebooks. Gently, Yvette touches the books and her husband’s hand at the same time. She closes her eyes, and, as if she can divine through touch, she sees him leaning towards Simone, drawing closer to her in a tender kiss. She doesn’t know whether or not Simone and Gustave have actually kissed, but what is far more important in this moment is that Yvette realizes they have kissed in a figurative sense.
It’s with masterfully gossamer touches like these that Piovano allows us entry into Simone’s summer of love. Le Stelle Inquiete is a magical interlude that shines a brief light on a woman whom T.S. Eliot considered a “genius akin to saints.”
Writer Elizabeth Johnston teaches at Concordia University.
LE STELLE INQUIETE, 2010 / Colour / 87 min, Dir. Emanuela Piovano, Italy – France.
Schedule :
August 28, 2010 • 21:40 • CINÉMA QUARTIER LATIN 10 • L10.28.6
August 29, 2010 • 17:10 • CINÉMA QUARTIER LATIN 10 • L10.29.4
For more information, go to the World Film Festival site.
