It has now been over a year since we had to interrupt a "ceremony" so dear to FIRSTonline readers due to Covid: the viewing and writing of a film that has just been released in cinemas. There was then a kind of pause, at the end of the first lockdown, but it didn't matter: we were all still stunned by what had just happened and not yet prepared for what would happen next. Now we are back and will talk about nomadland, a great success recently in theaters and it is no coincidence that this will be the title with which, we hope, we will pick up the thread of the cinematic story with our readers.
First of all, the "ceremony" of returning to the hall, in front of the big screen. There is no comparison: there will never be production of the various Netflix or Amazon Prime that can withstand the emotion of the great images projected at the cinema. Entering in the dark, looking for the assigned seats, listening to the audio at an adequate volume and appreciating the visions, especially of great panoramas, is in no way comparable to the comfortable armchair at home. A similar emotion came back to us when we were lucky enough to see the Napoleon by Abel Gance revived with the restoration of Francis Ford Coppola, projected in Rome, in front of the Colosseum, back in 1981, in the happy setting of the legendary "Estate Romana" with the live orchestra and on three enormous screens. An unforgettable dream. A film that Chaplin said was a "storm of images".
Going to the cinema could be considered a secular ritual that requires preparation and predisposition. We inform ourselves first, we follow a trend or an author, we follow a plot by looking for precedents, similarities or references to other cinematographic works. Far from it happens in front of television and the emotional state, at least for the writer, is of a very different nature.
“On the road again” was the first thought we had when we entered the room. Yes: it was really a return to ancient roads. The same ones we told you about when we proposed so many films on this online magazine. We are back to where we had already been and, in this regard, allow us a quote which, moreover, introduces us well to the film we are going to talk about: “The journey never ends. Only travelers end up. And they too can be prolonged in memory, in memory, in narration. When the traveler sat down on the sand of the beach and said, "There is nothing more to see," he knew it wasn't true. You have to see what you haven't seen, see again what you've already seen, see in spring what you saw in summer, see by day what you saw at night, with the sun where it rained the first time, see the green crops, the ripe fruit, the stone that has changed its place, the shadow that wasn't there. We need to go back to the steps already given, to repeat them, and to trace new paths alongside them. We have to start the journey again. Always. The traveler returns immediately” by José Saramago.
The same feeling can be felt for cinema: it is a story that never ends, like writing. Only that it happens with different and complementary tools: the pen and the camera. This, perhaps, is one of the many magics of cinema and we always hope that there is no other Covid that can threaten it. There is so much more to see. We come to nomadland: it is an auspicious title for a new and different season of cinema. We are talking about an anomalous film: there are no scenes of sex or blood and there is no mention of money or easy success. There aren't really the "S" that usually measure the approval of the general public. It's a film that doesn't have a classic "plot", there is no beginning or end. It is a film that speaks for itself, with fragments of images and sequences without an apparent logical thread. Yet it has its own solid internal structure, strong, robust and full of references to themes of enormous depth.
The story of a fragment of a life is proposed, as if it were an endless film, where we talk about a person who has decided to live as a nomad, without a roof over his head, without being considered marginal or peripheral, an alternative or discriminated against with respect to the "normal lives" of those who live in the metropolis, have a solid and well-paid job and enjoy solid social protection. And not surprisingly, the first images of the film take us into the heart of an Amazon distribution center, where Fern does occasional, seasonal work. Frances McNormand is a pillar of contemporary cinema and not surprisingly has won three Oscars for best actress. We have known and appreciated her with her role in Fargo by the Coen brothers and then find her again, in the superb interpretation of Three posters in Ebbing, Missouri of 2017 (see our review).
Fern is among the victims of the recession, of one of the many economic crises that are taking place in many parts of the world and which leave human stories, tragedies and loneliness on the ground from which it is difficult to recover. She decides to turn the page in another way: with her ramshackle Van she puts herself “… on the road” to live a nomadic life, not homeless but with a van as a home. The images of the great American landscapes are always very suggestive and the writer has experienced them directly: I have crossed large prairies with the legendary Greyhounds, as well as spent the nights in the Nevada desert, slept in a tent in the Rocky Mountains as well as in the YMCAs. Perhaps, for all of this, we particularly appreciated Nomadland: it can be a good omen for returning to the cinema, in large theaters, soon and well.
