Scene from the film The Monster in the Stone
Scene from the film The Monster in the Stone
Scene from the film The Monster in the Stone

The Monster in the Stone

Direction
Year 
2016
Country
  • France
Duration
50min 
Audio Tracks 
Subtitles 

Ignasi Duarte’s unique taste for circuitous methods of story-telling is a technique exemplified in his film Montemor (2012) and is developed further here in The Monster in the Stone. The film is conducted through a single interview with Alberto Laiseca who wrote many books including his masterpiece Los Sorias, a florid and erudite dystopia wherein myth is interspersed with comedy. At the start of the film Duarte creates a single rule for how the interview will be conducted: that the questions asked will be from Laiseca’s books. The premise is simple enough, or so it seems. Then a dialogue sets in between filmmaker and the author. The former is never seen and the latter mainly shot in close-up highlighting the so oft forgotten body of an author.

In this Borgesian game, Ignasi Duarte, the paradoxical and almost invisible interviewer, creates a dizzying space, dealing with fear, death, love, and myth. A game of mirrors in which literature infuses the reality of the interview creating in documentary an undecidable fiction. Does Laiseca answer in his own name or by way of the characters in his fiction? It is undecidable and there lies the purpose and the stakes of the film. Thus when asked: ‘Have you forsaken your imaginary personality?’ Laiseca simply answers: ‘I have no idea.’

Details

  • Original title
    El monstruo en la piedra
  • Direction
  • Screenplay
    Ignasi Duarte
  • DOP
    Andrés Fechtenholz
  • Editing
    Andrés Fechtenholz
  • Sound
    Daniela Ale, Mercedes Tennina
  • Duration
    50 min (46-90 min.)
  • Year
    2016
  • Country
    • France
  • Colour
    • Colour
  • Production
      • Bureau monumental & Maison de l’Amérique latine
      • France
  • Distribution
  • Festivals
    • 2016 FIDMarseille, Marseille (FR)
    • 2016 Pravo Ljudski Film Festival, Sarajevo (B&H)
    • 2016 Festival Internacional de Cine de Mar del Plata, Mar del Plata (AR)
    • 2016 L’Alternativa – Barcelona Independent Film Festival, Barcelona (ES)
    • 2016 Transcinema – Festival Internacional de Cine, Lima (PE)
    • 2017 Solothurner Filmtage, Solothurn (CH)​
    • 2017 Mostra de Cinema Llatinoamericà de Catalunya, Lleida (ES)
    • 2017 DOC CORNER du Marché du Film, Video Library FIDMarseille, Cannes (FR)
    • 2017 FestiFreak, Special screening, La Plata (AR)
  • Awards
    • 2016 FIDMarseille, Prize: Special mention Prix du Centre national des arts plastiques (Cnap), Marseille (FR)
    • 2016 L’Alternativa – Barcelona Independent Film Festival, Prize Panorama, Barcelona (ES)
    • 2017 Mostra de Cinema Llatinoamericà de Catalunya, Prize: Special mention, Lleida (ES)

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