Weeds grow through the cracks in every pavement in Alice Rohrwacher's wayward, wondrous La Chimera. They twine through the flagstones outside the crumbling Tuscan manor where Flora (Isabella Rossellini) awaits the return of a daughter who disappeared, imperiously ignoring the visiting chatter of the four who did not.

They straggle between the sleepers of the railway tracks outside the abandoned Riparbella station house, tripping up the little kids – hair sticky from headlice ointment – who play on them. Just like the ragged life that bursts and floods the frames of Helène Louvart's wild, windswept photography, the weeds of La Chimera can't be stopped and won't be tamed, reaching up into the sunlight from the cool, dark underground. Which is also, of course, where the dead live.

THEMATIC CONNECTION

Ending the selected screenings, with this philosophically delicate and beautiful tale of thieves, bandits and crooks, scheming to find riches – but within the heart of its posse, a soul is dealing with an immense grief which seems to be nothing but permanent.

Everyone we turn, we are reminded of the lost pearls which have touched our lives.