Synopsis
This experimental short film gives the floor to Robert Dole who gives us his story and exposes his vision of schizophrenia. The theme of mental illness is echoed here in a cinematographic treatment that explores the materiality of film and magnetic tapes to find points of meeting and detachment, spaces resonating with the fall and redemption of Robert Dole.
A word from Tënk
When Robert Dole shares with us his journey into the dark night of the soul, he links his dizzying descent to those encountered by all mystics before him. The steps are the same, regardless of the era, he tells us. On the path, one meets enlightenment before the night. And comes together, on the way out of the abyss.
Despite the fear that torments him and his extreme awareness of his psychic frailties which threaten to expel him back into the night, Dole speaks with assurance. For it is this link that ties to the prophets, which grants him a footing; even if he slips, his connection to the divine sustains him beyond the social.
Through all of the dissolution, the ruptures, and the abstraction evoked by a film that relentlessly jumps and dissolves, Dole does not lose his footing; he floats, pursuing the blissful visions that once visited him, and reveals an entire unfathomable part of the madness. That of the mystery carried back by the few who have survived the dark nights of the soul.
Naomie Décarie-Daigneault
Tënk Artistic Director
