2022 - 50' – French, French Creole (Available subtitles: German, English, Italian)
On Reunion Island, a few families live on the land of their ancestors in the remote mountain wilderness of a national park. One day, as the wind rises and carries with it echoes from the past, the inhabitants find themselves alone in the face of danger.
Julien Mounier was born in 1992 and grew up in the Paris region. He became passionate about cinema in high school, shot his first short films, and then dreamt of becoming a director of photography. While studying cinema, in France and abroad, he started working as a cameraman and editor in various professional contexts. At the age of 25, he moved to Reunion Island and joined a local association, Cyberun, for a project supporting and promoting Creole culture. In 2019, he wrote and directed his first short documentary film, Oui, monsieur. This experience confirmed his desire to continue in documentary filmmaking. To better develop his new project, he decided to get more education. In November 2019, he joined ZeLIG - School for Documentary, Television and New Media in Bolzano, Italy. And followed a training in directing. Orera is his graduation film.
Nicola Maccanetti was born in Lugano (Switzerland) in 1995. In 2019 he completed his studies in film production at SAE institute in Berlin. During the past years he worked with various Swiss and German productions as a camera operator, boom operator and assistant director. In 2019, he moved to Bolzano to continue his studies in photography at ZeLIG, documentary film school.
Andrea Tomarchio was born in Catania on 23 March 1996. After obtaining a three-year degree in International Communication in Catania, he moved first to Bologna where he specialised in Cinema, Television and Multimedia Production and then to Bolzano where he attended the editing class of ZeLIG - school of documentary cinema. He collaborated as an editing assistant with Elefant Film in Bologna and with Zalab in Rome, for the latter working alongside Chiara Russo on the films "Po" by Andrea Segre and "Marcel" by Jasmine Trinka.
The desire to make this film was born while I was attending a festival several years ago, organized by the inhabitants of Aurère. They wanted to finance a new water network, which they would build themselves. I was fascinated by what it said about a community being able to take charge of its destiny collectively. I had just glimpsed at the other face of Mafate, the one that the tourist just passing by can not know. After two uneventful years, in 2022 a particularly intense cyclone season took place. In February, the island was hit twice. These violent episodes, although usual for the Reunionese, gave us the opportunity to tell the story of the community faced with an emergency. It is also the history of Mafate and its settlements that helps understand the relationship between the Mafatais and their land. It was important for us to introduce the past, to give relief to the present. Thanks to sound recordings made in the 80s, it was possible for us to tell the story of this freedom that was often endangered, historically by the French administrations, and today by the elements. Finally, we wanted to make this story sensitive. The Cirque de Mafate is a site that is experienced sensorially; it is a space that is felt before being understood. We wished to create an organic link between the inhabitants and the place in this film. We thought of the meteorological event as a manifestation of the intimate, and through its inhabitants we tried to give a voice to Mafate.
Country of production: Italy
Shooting Format(s): HD 1080@25p
Original Master Format: HD 1080@25p
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Screening Format: DCP, Apple ProRes or any on request
Audio Format: 5.1, Stereo (2.0)
Running time: 50’
Subtitles available: German / English / Italian
Director: Julien Mounier
Cinematographer: Nicola Maccanetti
Editor: Andrea Tomarchio
Soundrecordist: Andrea Tomarchio
ZeLIG is located in Bolzano, Italy, a multilingual city where different cultures live together. The school is a place of exchange for students, teachers and film professionals from all over the world.
At ZeLIG the spoken languages are German, Italian and English. This creative approach to linguistic variety opens the gates to the international markets and to future opportunities.
