PODCAST | Chiara Nicoletti interviews Franz Rogowski, actor of the film Disco boy.
After working with Gabriele Mainetti in Freaks Out, Franz Rogowski is again the centre of another italian yet international film, the debut feature film by Giacomo Abruzzese, Disco boy, in competition at the 73rd Berlinale. The german actor talks about the film being perceived as a coming-of-age as his character, Aleksei , a young Belarusian joining the French Foreign Legion, is in search for his place in the world.
Disco boy: Aleksei is a young Belarusian on the run from a past he must bury. Entering into a kind of Faustian pact, he becomes a member of the French Foreign Legion in exchange for the promise of French citizenship. Far away in the Niger Delta, Jomo is a revolutionary activist engaged in an armed struggle to defend his community. Aleksei is a soldier, Jomo a guerrilla fighter. As a result of one more senseless war, their destinies will intertwine. What is “otherness” and how do you absorb it into who you are as you go through life, cross borders and find yourself inhabiting an ever-changing physical and mental space? Giacomo Abbruzzese exhibits a remarkable sense of out-of-the-box thinking and inventiveness as he explores such questions in a visually striking work that is ripe with poetry and tension. Bodies fall into trances that are both revelatory and altruistic because they represent an opportunity to commune with others. Accompanying this magical reverie is a powerful score from electronic musician Vitalic that helps turn the night club into a place of transcendence. The disco becomes the ultimate destination for those who keep their sights firmly set on the sacred horizon of utopia.
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