The feature debut of writer-directors Kevin Walker and Jack Auen, Chronovisor, exists as an unnerving conspiracy piece that speaks to the preservation of historical truth.
Chronovisor Review
Roman Polanski’s undervalued 1999 creeper, The Ninth Gate, wears the label of literary horror with an occult edge. The Johnny Depp-starrer was unique in owning such a moniker. The fascinating new film Chronovisor now shares the occult-literary thriller description. The feature debut of writer-directors Kevin Walker and Jack Auen doesn’t morph into horror like Polanski’s film, but exists as an unnerving conspiracy piece that speaks to the preservation of historical truth.
The title references an unfathomable device claimed to be created by Benedictine monk and musicologist Pellegrino Ernetti in the 1970s. The supposed contraption is said to have the ability to record any historical event and replay it exactly as it happened. With his “time machine”, the viewer would experience actual history as if watching an undiluted televised replay with its truths intact. Ernetti claimed his invention allowed him to observe Christ’s crucifixion and a speech by Roman philosopher Cicero. Ernetti went so far as to produce a photograph claiming to be of Jesus Christ before his crucifixion.
Of course, there is no reality where such a device could exist and the few scholars and scientists that took even the slightest interest have collectively called Ernetti’s claims, “pseudoscientific.” The supposed picture of Christ was found to be an image of a sculpture. Before his death in 1994, Pellegrino Ernetti confessed that it was all untrue. His belief that the device could work, followed by its failure, led him to the deception in the hope of giving faith to others. While his death is certainly a matter of public record, the film’s screenplay crafts his disappearance as a mysterious circumstance.
Time machines are strictly fictional, but Chronovisor uses its legend to create one hell of a good film.
Anne-Laure Sellier is Béatrice Courte, an academic working for Columbia University currently researching the existence of Ernetti’s invention. Unable to determine if it will be revealed as fact or folly, Béatrice unravels a mystery that becomes a personal obsession.
Chronovisor becomes an experience of aesthetic suspense. Using compositions from Gustav Holst (specifically, choices from his masterwork The Planets), a good portion of the film sees the screen filled with pages of text that highlight the important passages. The audience is cast in the role of research assistant, giving a unique angle to the film’s design. Along with Béatrice’s phone calls with various people around the globe who may help with her investigation, Walker and Auen manage consistent interest in their eerie narrative that recalls the best conspiracy thrillers of the 1970s.
After learning about Ernetti’s supposed invention, the filmmakers did a deep dive into its “creator”; disappearing through endless wormholes of philosophical texts and research reports. Such tireless determination is reflected in the character of Béatrice.
The endless amount of important details that build throughout the film are incredible. Working as their own editors, the directors are able to make it all so stunningly edge-of-your-seat while keeping the film intellectually stimulating. Leo Zhang’s camera sets the film in warm tones; dark edges with foregrounds illuminated by soft light. His designs keep a purposefully claustrophobic film visually distinct.
We exist in an age where computer and television screens hold connections to almost everything in our lives. Over the past decade, many have lost their identities in the real world. The phrase “online personality” has become a dangerous reality. There are those who will spend their waking moments chatting online, as actual society holds too much stress. The film is also a thinly veiled warning on how we are losing the ability to connect on personal levels. Intimacy is becoming a rarity.
The screenplay comments on another level of receding humanity; the pleasure of books-in-hand and the importance of reading. Regarding research capabilities, the computer age has certainly made it easier, but facts found on the web can rarely be trusted. For journalists, the “hunt” for factual evidence used to consist of endless phone calls and tiring hours combing through papers and files, looking for the golden goose of fact. Returning to intimacy, the best investigative journalists could (occasionally) tap into a human connection with a source; a skill that would put them closer to their intended result. Be it manipulation for a story or a real bond (but still for the story), the internet has made such bonds less likely.
Chronovisor brings this original style of journalistic gumption to the forefront. Alan J. Pakula’s 1976 classic All the President’s Men kept audiences riveted by watching Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman make calls, peruse books, and interview people; getting ever-closer to their truth. Directors Auen and Walker honor Pakula by achieving a visceral cinematic thrill as Béatrice’s drive is the real machine that will see the evidence unfold.
It will be the obsession that becomes manipulative, confusing Béatrice until her own sense of purpose becomes askew.
Verdict
The finale becomes a somewhat Cronenberg-esque head trip into real questions regarding how we are affected by dwelling on the past. Through this intellectually compelling and ultimately alarming sequence, the screenplay’s thematic aspirations are achieved. Jack Auen and Kevin Walker have created an enthralling work with a uniquely hypnotic cinematic structure that stimulates the mind while speaking to a world of distorted realities.
Chronovisor is a captivating piece that finds a connection to a current culture where perversion (and suppression) of facts reigns over collective truth.
Chronovisor is out now in select theaters.
Reviewer: Anthony Francis. He is the CEO and Editor-in-Chief of The Movie Revue. You can find his reviews, interviews, and other works at TheMovieRevue.com, as well as on Instagram and Facebook.
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