La Chimera

Chicago International Film Festival: Won Best Cinematography, Best Cast Ensemble

European Film Awards: Won Production Design

National Board Review: Won one of top five international films

Sao Paolo International Film Festival: Won International fiction

Valladolid International Film Festival: Won Best Film

Festival Cinéma Méditerranéen de Bruxelles: Won Festival Jury Prize

Just out of jail and still searching for his late beloved Beniamina, crumpled English archaeologist Arthur reconnects with his wayward crew of tombaroli accomplices – a happy-go-lucky collective of itinerant grave-robbers who survive by looting Etruscan tombs and fencing the ancient treasures they dig up. Arthur isn’t interested in the artefacts, though; he’s seeking a legendary door to the underworld, and to Beniamina.

When we talk about “movie magic,” the first thing that comes to mind is often something like the bikes achieving liftoff in “E.T.” But it applies no less to Alice Rohrwacher’s wondrous “La Chimera,” a grubbily transcendent folk tale of a film that finds its enchantment buried in the ground. Jake Coyle/The Associated PressThe movie is so interested in archeology (the credits dedicate it "to all archeologists, custodians of every end") that it becomes an analogue for the viewing experience. Rohrwacher asks us to interpret La Chimera the way archaeologists interpret fragments of the past. The Screen Rant/Alexander Harrison.Rohrwacher weaves this thread in and out of the more grounded storylines with the most exquisite even-handedness, evoking Greek mythology while creating her own legend. Sophie Monks Kaufman/Time Out