Das Ethnokino präsentiert:


  Ethnografische Filme von Cecilia Mangini und Mattis van de Port, Italy / The Netherlands, 2014, OV I/g & OV E/Portuguese/e, 82 Minuten

Stendali – Suonano Ancora & The Possibility of Spirits



STENDALI – SUONANO ANCORA



A unique documentary on the tra­ditional mourning ritual in Griko, an ancient language of Salento.

THE POSSIBILITY OF SPIRITS



What is it that you film when you film a spirit? Shot in Bahia (Brazil), «The Possibility of Spirits» is an essay film that keeps the baffling mystery of spirit possession center stage. In a poetic assemblage of images and words, it offers an alternative for the kind of documentary that either exoticizes spirit possession in spectacular imagery, or extinguishes the wonder of the phenomenon in explanatory prose. The possession ceremonies, filmed in close up, first and foremost reveal that we don't know what it is that we are looking at. Words -- of the filmmaker, as well as of his interlocutors -- are allowed to drift out of meaning. Trying to grasp the phenomenon, they become silence, or laughter, or screaming. Paying tribute to the extra-ordinariness of its subject matter, this film invites viewers to allow themselves to be confused and -- in that confusion -- consider the possibility of spirits.