Iceland's clairvoyants and mediums are profiled in this curious documentary on supernatural phenomenon.Iceland's clairvoyants and mediums are profiled in this curious documentary on supernatural phenomenon.Iceland's clairvoyants and mediums are profiled in this curious documentary on supernatural phenomenon.
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Investigations into the Invisible World is a documentary film made in Iceland
Enquête sur le Monde Invisible is a documentary film made in Iceland. Living in a primitive nature, always in formation, this modern nation maintains a secret relationship with a community of invisible beings : the elves.
Many Icelanders also affirm to have seen ghosts. Others observe aquatic monsters or communicate with angels and the extraterrestrial. Resting on disconcerting confessions, this investigation confronts us with a fundamental question : are we alone in the universe?
Jean-Michel Roux(French director, author of the sympathetic Thousand Wonders of the Universe), offers us here a single and completely atypical work in its intentions as in its result. The film is located in a seldom explored fringe of the cinema, the sometimes thin border which separates pure objective documentary from fiction film . Thus, testimonies of all the Icelanders are entirely authentic but J.M. Roux has the intelligence not to show them in a rough way and hoping that they will disturb the public, but on the contrary exploits the form by using cinematographic techniques in order to present these testimonies under a strange view which is based on the usual representations of the mysterious on the large like the small screen (luminous halo etc).
In the same way, it makes sure that the testimonies appear sometimes absurd and full of references to the cinema (very fond of fantastic and paranormal), but their content is perfectly disconcerting by their logic and the natural tone of the questioned people. It also admirably managed to combine the grainy and unusual image of super 16 scope, and the magnificence and the strangeness of the Icelandic landscapes in order to spare contemplative breaks after each major testimony so that the spectator can reflect and be disturbed by what it has just heard.
The atmospheric music is also for a lot in the so particular environment of the film, withing the just limit of the New Age cliché, but perfectly in agreement with the lunar quality of the images, in order to place the spectator in a state necessary to a greater receptivity. Here is a work which should be seen by all the amateurs of fantastic as it makes it possible to reflect on the topics which constitute their films of predilection, in a different and disconcerting way, by replacing them in reality and especially without them having as only justification dramatic stakes. The film is thus built on the opposition between the veracity of testimonies and the artificial aspect of the cinematographic techniques, which allows J.M. Roux to give to his film an aspect often disturbing so much the questions raised by these testimonies are unsettling.
The end of the film is for this reason of a rare ambition, not in its form (then again ...) but in the questions which it asks and especially the vertiginous and finally very positive prospects that it offers. "The existence of elves, ghosts, extraterrestrial beings, a life after death, was never proved. It is similar with God : nobody has proved if he exists or not." Quote from Mrs Vigdis Finnbogadottir, President of the Republic of Iceland of 1980 to 1996.
Many Icelanders also affirm to have seen ghosts. Others observe aquatic monsters or communicate with angels and the extraterrestrial. Resting on disconcerting confessions, this investigation confronts us with a fundamental question : are we alone in the universe?
Jean-Michel Roux(French director, author of the sympathetic Thousand Wonders of the Universe), offers us here a single and completely atypical work in its intentions as in its result. The film is located in a seldom explored fringe of the cinema, the sometimes thin border which separates pure objective documentary from fiction film . Thus, testimonies of all the Icelanders are entirely authentic but J.M. Roux has the intelligence not to show them in a rough way and hoping that they will disturb the public, but on the contrary exploits the form by using cinematographic techniques in order to present these testimonies under a strange view which is based on the usual representations of the mysterious on the large like the small screen (luminous halo etc).
In the same way, it makes sure that the testimonies appear sometimes absurd and full of references to the cinema (very fond of fantastic and paranormal), but their content is perfectly disconcerting by their logic and the natural tone of the questioned people. It also admirably managed to combine the grainy and unusual image of super 16 scope, and the magnificence and the strangeness of the Icelandic landscapes in order to spare contemplative breaks after each major testimony so that the spectator can reflect and be disturbed by what it has just heard.
The atmospheric music is also for a lot in the so particular environment of the film, withing the just limit of the New Age cliché, but perfectly in agreement with the lunar quality of the images, in order to place the spectator in a state necessary to a greater receptivity. Here is a work which should be seen by all the amateurs of fantastic as it makes it possible to reflect on the topics which constitute their films of predilection, in a different and disconcerting way, by replacing them in reality and especially without them having as only justification dramatic stakes. The film is thus built on the opposition between the veracity of testimonies and the artificial aspect of the cinematographic techniques, which allows J.M. Roux to give to his film an aspect often disturbing so much the questions raised by these testimonies are unsettling.
The end of the film is for this reason of a rare ambition, not in its form (then again ...) but in the questions which it asks and especially the vertiginous and finally very positive prospects that it offers. "The existence of elves, ghosts, extraterrestrial beings, a life after death, was never proved. It is similar with God : nobody has proved if he exists or not." Quote from Mrs Vigdis Finnbogadottir, President of the Republic of Iceland of 1980 to 1996.
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- cinetudes
- May 25, 2004
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- Investigation Into the Invisible World
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- $28,740
- Runtime1 hour 27 minutes
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By what name was Enquête sur le monde invisible (2002) officially released in Canada in English?
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