Markers: Films that push the boundaries of the documentary form
In 1961, a team of speleologists descended and charted the Bifurto Abyss in Southern Italy, then considered the deepest cave on Earth. At once an experimental nature film and a narrative "freely inspired" by the team's quest, the pensive and breathtakingly beautiful Il Buco recreates this journey 700 metres towards the centre of the Earth. The anticipated follow-up to director Michelangelo Frammartino's acclaimed Le quattro volte (2010), over 10 years in the making, the nearly wordless exploration is informed by a masterful, painterly discernment of light and shadow and carried by an equally rich and enveloping soundscape. Incorporating sequences set in the neighbouring town and a tale of an aging shepherd in the surrounding hills, Il Buco places the timeless wonder of the natural formation below the Earth's surface in dialogue with the impermanence of the living world passing by above it. Jesse Cumming