Six months after its screening at the Cannes Film Festival, The Kingdom finally hits theaters this week. From its heartbreaking plot to its sublime and wild panoramas, here are three good reasons to go see it in the cinema without delay!
For its plot, as thrilling as it is moving
Corsica, 1995. Lesia (Ghjuvanna Benedetti) is experiencing her first summer as a teenager. One day, a man breaks in and takes her on a motorbike to an isolated villa where she finds her father (Saveriu Santucci), in hiding, surrounded by his men. A war breaks out in the community and the noose tightens around the clan. Death strikes. Then begins a chase during which father and daughter will learn to look at each other, to understand each other and to love each other.
Presented last May at the Cannes Film Festival in the Un Certain Regard category, The Kingdom is the first feature film by Corsican director Julien Colonna. In the credits, moviegoers will also notice the involvement of Jeanne Herry, director of the sublime Pupille and I will always see your faces, who brought her valuable scriptwriting expertise to this project.
Because it is precisely for the richness of its intrigue that The Kingdom seduces in the first place. Purified in appearance, it first strikes by the dull tension which runs through it from start to finish like an invisible red thread, by the danger which always seems to cover its characters in its shadow like an inescapable sword of Damocles.
But this escapade, as thrilling as it may be, is not enough to make the captivated spectator forget the emotion that remains beneath the drama. Because The Kingdom is above all a love story, the one that unites this father and his child.
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After Pupille and I will always see your faces, Jeanne Herry signs with the scenario of The Kingdom a new tour de force by depicting pure emotion with finesse. But Julien Colonna, for this first feature film, manages to capture the very essence of this filial love. “The first spark was born six years ago, when my wife told me she was pregnantsays the filmmaker. This news shook me quite a bit for a few weeks. Unconsciously, I wondered about the child I was going to have, the father I was going to try to be, and inevitably the child I had been, the parents I had had…” This experience, as much as his original link with the Isle of Beauty, allows him to create a first personal and intimate film, as thrilling as it is heartbreaking.
For its absolutely authentic interpretation
Last spring, Borgo, a gripping thriller, already took moviegoers to Corsica by offering the point of view of a person foreign to the island and its customs, played by the brilliant Hafsia Herzi. Refusing to entrust its distribution to the big names in cinema, The Kingdom is betting on authenticity by offering its characters to non-professionals.
An unusual process, which Julien Colonna assumes and justifies: “A large majority of them are non-actors from Corsican society, chosen from several hundred people […] for their sensitivity, their capacity for work and their deep nature. Once chosen, Ghjuvanna and Saveriu worked tirelessly for several months during numerous workshops between Corsica and Paris.
Seeing them evolve and realize their potential during this preparation was very moving. Working with them, the clan and the rest of the cast was a most extraordinary human and spiritual adventure. They let themselves be guided without knowing where they were going, just because of the trust they placed in me, and I am eternally grateful to them.”
To Life
A successful bet for the filmmaker, who allows his endearing cast to achieve a degree of authenticity rarely equaled. In the main roles, Ghjuvanna Benedetti and Saveriu Santucci act as real revelations, which the viewer will be eager to discover, we hope very soon, in other roles.
For Corsican landscapes, much more than a backdrop
If the Isle of Beauty remains one of the most touristy regions of France, it is both for the typicality of its culture and traditions and for the beauty of its grandiose nature. So many attributes to which The Kingdom honors, since the feature film tears Corsica from its status as a simple spatial setting to raise it to the rank of a character in its own right.
To Life
Much more than a backdrop, the island becomes both the source of the intrigue and its adventures, the reason for its dilemmas and its internal struggles, but also the safest and most beautiful means for the father and his daughter to escape. A place outside of time and space seeming to escape the rules and laws of the metropolis, this isolated world becomes their kingdom when, forgetting the conflict rumbling in the distance, Lesia and her father share a moment of peace by the sea.
Sublime and heartbreaking, The Kingdom, Julien Colonna's first feature film co-written by Jeanne Herry, can be seen now in the cinema.
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