The Making and Unmaking of the Earth

Bubbling molten rock. Water that evaporates immediately on contact with it. Slowly, very slowly, half-coagulated lava decelerates in the channels that guide it, a thin layer of hardened matter forms on the surface, and the distant and shrill echo of the immeasurable forces at work in mysterious underground spaces resonates on the fragile sides of a skull. Jessica Bardsley’s new film, five years after The Blazing World (VdR, 2013), begins with an explosion of lava before plunging into the depths of the earth, in a skilful montage of archive images and accounts evoking both physical and emotional suffering. Appropriating a geological metaphor borrowed from Elaine Scarry, she constructs a filmic language whose rich evocativeness creates the conditions for renewed perception: the manner in which we feel the weight of a pebble in the palm of our hand is connected to the memory of an event, whereas a crystal becomes the perfect incarnation of a stabbing migraine, rendered visible by a cinematographical gesture of rare beauty.

Céline Guénot

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