Babilonia mon amour

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Babilonia mon amour

Babilonia mon amour

original title:

Babilonia mon amour

cinematography:

editing:

producer:

country:

Italy

year:

2017

film run:

72'

format:

colour

status:

Ready (09/01/2017)

festivals & awards:

The film is an act of giving. Pierpaolo Verdecchi spent the last two years of his life leaving everything behind, no production, no funds backing him, just to follow the characters you will get to know watching the film. he lived with them in the streets of barcelona and sleeping in squats, occupied buildings, train stations, being one of them, one of the group.
he came back with this incredible footage, both easthetically incredible and also in the contents. so he lived in the suburbia of barcelona with abdulkadhr, paco, big karim in the wheelchair and little karim, our main characters. they are illegally in europe, they are somehow one single character, their group. they live in some kind of limbo, suspended, no regular job, no documents, no future to organize, a day by day life, made of survival, short term jobs, stealing, pushing weed or other drugs in the streets. their attempt is to resist and maintain a certain integrity and purity, sometimes they succed, and we have moments of joy and sharing, like a surreal scene with a funny day in deserted beach playing golf and singing, sometimes they fail, and up crossing the ramblas drunk and with a selfdestroying attitude, confronting police seemly with no reason, and seeing some of them brought away by police. they immediately repent, they don't like to be “slaves in the streets of babylonia”.
babylonia is for them full of temptations and corruption of their still strong spiritual dimension. we are interested in this strange kind of resiliance, in front of a strong moloch, the urban landscape, for them mainly the post industrial suburbia where they find shelter.

pierpaolo has a strong personal style, strong visuals and easthetics coming form his background as a photographer. he mixes it perfectly with his attitude towards an observational, not judgemental work, immersive, by their side.